Bush Administration Says Title IX Should Stay as It Is

NYTimes ^ | 7/12/03 | FRANK LITSKY

[RJCogburn]

The Bush administration, which had been considering changes that might have eased standards for satisfying the law that expanded opportunities for girls and women in sports, instead reaffirmed yesterday how the law, known as Title IX, is enforced.

In a letter sent to colleges and high schools by Gerald A. Reynolds, the assistant secretary of education for civil rights, the basic provisions of Title IX were upheld. At the same time, Reynolds said in the letter that men's teams should not be eliminated for the sake of Title IX equality.

The National Women's Law Center, a nonprofit organization that works to protect women's rights, called the administration's decision a huge victory for female athletes.

"This puts to rest all the uncertainty and speculation whether the administration and the Department of Education would weaken Title IX," Marcia D. Greenberger, the center's co-president, said in a telephone interview from her office in Washington.

"And it allows attention to be where it should be, to enforce the law and to continue the fight for an equal playing field for young women in this country."

Title IX, passed in 1972, prohibits sex discrimination in educational programs that receive federal aid. As applied to sports, it has pressed institutions to expand opportunities for young women.

The National Women's Law Center says Title IX has led to increases of women's participation in sports of more than 400 percent in colleges and of more than 800 percent in high schools. But Title IX supporters point out statistical equality has not been achieved; 56 percent of college students are women and 42 percent of the athletes are women.

Last June, Secretary of Education Rod Paige created a 15-member commission to study Title IX. Women's groups feared that the commission would propose measures to weaken the law, and the commission's 70-page report did not allay those concerns.

The letter sent yesterday by Reynolds clarified the ways Title IX is currently enforced, but it did not significantly change them.

The schools and colleges were reminded that they could select one of three ways to comply with Title IX:

¶Keep the percentage of female athletes more or less the same as the percentage of female students.

¶Continue to add women's teams or to expand rosters.

¶Offer women's sports that are popular in the institution's region.

Reynolds emphasized that schools should be aware of their options and that they did not have to use the proportionality standard, which has been most commonly employed.

Reynolds reminded the institutions that his office "does not require quotas" and that strict proportionality is not required if the second or third alternatives are used. That could help men's nonrevenue sports like swimming, wrestling and gymnastics, which have lost teams as colleges have struggled to meet Title IX requirements.

"Nothing in Title IX requires the cutting or reduction of teams in order to demonstrate compliance with Title IX, and the elimination of teams is a disfavored practice," he said in the letter.

Greenberger contended that substantial inequality in collegiate sports still existed. Women receive little more than 40 percent of opportunities to play college sports, she said, and athletic scholarships for women are worth, cumulatively, $50 million less than athletic scholarships for men. College athletic budgets are twice as large for men as for women, she added. "While there has been enormous progress, there is still a long way to go," Greenberger said. "It's a relief that there is still a Title IX to rely on."

Eric Pearson, chairman of the College Sports Council, an umbrella organization representing some coaches' groups and athletic groups, was critical of Reynolds's letter, The Associated Press reported. Pearson said the Education Department failed to do enough to prevent the reduction in athletic opportunities for men because of Title IX.

"They've misread the American public on this," Pearson said, according to The Associated Press.

[RJCogburn]

George W. Bush is either one of the biggest cowards ever to sit in the oval office or he's a closet liberal.

I don't think he is either. I think he is simply a politician whose goal is election...power and percs.

[Dan from Michigan]

Another bad decision.

The victim here is 'smaller' men's sports. Instead of expanding women's sports, they cut sports like wrestling, crew, rowing, and track.

If football was exempted, I'd have less of a problem.