Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, renamed in 2002 the
Patsy T. Mink Equal Opportunity in Education Act in honor of its principal author, but more commonly known simply as
Title IX, is a
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
law enacted on June 23, 1972. The law states: "No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance..."
Although the most prominent aspect of Title IX is its impact on high school and
collegiate athleticsCollege athletics refers primarily to sports and athletic competition organized and funded by institutions of tertiary education . In the United States, college athletics is a two-tiered system. The first tier includes the sports that are sanctioned by one of the collegiate sport governing bodies...
, the original statute made no explicit mention of athletics.
The legislation covers all educational activities, and complaints under Title IX alleging
discriminationDiscrimination is a sociological term refering to treatment taken toward or against a person of a certain group that is taken in consideration based on class or category. The United Nations explains: "Discriminatory behaviours take many forms, but they all involve some form of exclusion or...
in fields such as
scienceScience is in its broadest sense to any systematic knowledge-base or prescriptive practice that is capable of resulting in a prediction or predictable type of outcome...
or math education, or in other aspects of academic life such as access to
health careHealth care , is the treatment and management of illness, and the preservation of health through services offered by the medical, dental, complementary and alternative medicine, pharmaceutical, clinical laboratory sciences , nursing, and allied health professions...
and
dormitoryA dormitory, often shortened to dorm, in the United States is a residence hall consisting of sleeping quarters or entire buildings primarily providing sleeping and residential quarters for large numbers of people, often boarding school, college or university students. In the U.K...
facilities, are not unheard of.
Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, renamed in 2002 the
Patsy T. Mink Equal Opportunity in Education Act in honor of its principal author, but more commonly known simply as
Title IX, is a
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
law enacted on June 23, 1972. The law states: "No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance..."
Although the most prominent aspect of Title IX is its impact on high school and
collegiate athleticsCollege athletics refers primarily to sports and athletic competition organized and funded by institutions of tertiary education . In the United States, college athletics is a two-tiered system. The first tier includes the sports that are sanctioned by one of the collegiate sport governing bodies...
, the original statute made no explicit mention of athletics.
Applicability and compliance
The legislation covers all educational activities, and complaints under Title IX alleging
discriminationDiscrimination is a sociological term refering to treatment taken toward or against a person of a certain group that is taken in consideration based on class or category. The United Nations explains: "Discriminatory behaviours take many forms, but they all involve some form of exclusion or...
in fields such as
scienceScience is in its broadest sense to any systematic knowledge-base or prescriptive practice that is capable of resulting in a prediction or predictable type of outcome...
or math education, or in other aspects of academic life such as access to
health careHealth care , is the treatment and management of illness, and the preservation of health through services offered by the medical, dental, complementary and alternative medicine, pharmaceutical, clinical laboratory sciences , nursing, and allied health professions...
and
dormitoryA dormitory, often shortened to dorm, in the United States is a residence hall consisting of sleeping quarters or entire buildings primarily providing sleeping and residential quarters for large numbers of people, often boarding school, college or university students. In the U.K...
facilities, are not unheard of. It also applies to non-sport activities such as
school bandA school band is a group of student musicians who rehearse and perform instrumental music together. A concert band is usually under the direction of one or more conductors...
and clubs; however,
social fraternities and sororitiesFraternities and sororities are fraternal social organizations for undergraduate students. In English, the term refers mainly to such organizations at colleges and universities in North America, although it is also applied to analogous European groups also known as corporations...
, sex-specific youth clubs such as
Girl ScoutsThe Girl Scouts of the United States of America is a youth organization for girls in the United States and American girls living abroad...
and
Boy ScoutsThe Boy Scouts of America is one of the largest youth organizations in the United States, with over four million youth members in its age-related divisions...
, and Girls State and Boys State are specifically exempt from Title IX requirements.
Title IX is administered by the Office for Civil Rights in the
U.S. Department of EducationThe United States Department of Education, also referred to as ED or the ED for Education Department, is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government...
(OCR). It applies to an entire school or institution if any part of that school receives federal funds; hence, athletic programs are subject to Title IX, even though there is very little direct federal funding of school sports. The regulations implementing Title IX require all institutions receiving federal funds to conduct self-evaluations of whether they offer equal opportunities based on sex and to provide written assurances to the Dept. of Education that the institution is in compliance for the period that the federally funded equipment or facilities remain in use.
With respect to
athleticCollege athletics refers primarily to sports and athletic competition organized and funded by institutions of tertiary education . In the United States, college athletics is a two-tiered system. The first tier includes the sports that are sanctioned by one of the collegiate sport governing bodies...
programs, the Dept. of Education evaluates the following factors in determining whether equal treatment exists:
(1) Whether the selection of sports and levels of competition effectively accommodate the interests and abilities of members of both sexes;
(2) The provision of equipment and supplies;
(3) Scheduling of games and practice time;
(4) Travel and per diem allowance;
(5) Opportunity to receive coaching and academic tutoring on mathematics only;
(6) Assignment and compensation of coaches and tutors;
(7) Provision of locker rooms, practice and competitive facilities;
(8) Provision of medical and training facilities and services;
(9) Provision of housing and dining facilities and services;
(10) Publicity.
Unequal aggregate expenditures for members of each sex or unequal expenditures for male and female teams if a recipient operates or sponsors separate teams will not constitute noncompliance with this section, but the Assistant Secretary [of Education for Civil Rights] may consider the failure to provide necessary funds for teams for one sex in assessing equality of opportunity for members of each sex.
On November 24, 2006, the Department of Education OCR regulations were amended to provide greater flexibility in the operation of single-sex classes or extracurricular activities at the primary or secondary school level.
Three-prong test of compliance
In 1979, the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare under Jimmy Carter's administration issued a policy interpretation for Title IX, including what has become known as the "three-prong test" of an institution's compliance.
- Prong one - Providing athletic opportunities that are substantially proportionate to the student enrollment, OR
- Prong two - Demonstrate a continual expansion of athletic opportunities for the underrepresented sex, OR
- Prong three - Full and effective accommodation of the interest and ability of underrepresented sex.
A recipient of federal funds can demonstrate compliance with Title IX by meeting any one of the three prongs.
On March 17, 2005, OCR announced a clarification of prong three of the three-part test of Title IX compliance. The guidance concerned the use web-based surveys to determine the level of interest in varsity athletics among the under-represented sex.
Implementation and litigation
In 1992, the U.S. Supreme Court held in
Franklin v Gwinnett County Public Schools that schools which failed to comply with Title IX could be sued for compensatory and punitive damages.
In one specific instance, Title IX was instrumental in a court case involving
Louisiana State UniversityLouisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, most often referred to as Louisiana State University or LSU, is a public coeducational university located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The University was founded in 1853 near Pineville, Louisiana, under the name Louisiana State...
. In 1996, a federal court referenced Title IX in ruling that LSU violated the civil rights of female athletes with "arrogant ignorance" of their needs. Since this ruling, LSU has made changes in its athletic programs to achieve compliance.
In an "unusual" case, Title IX was invoked to justify a school's decision to upgrade its
footballAmerican football, known in the United States and Canada simply as football, and often as Gridiron or Tackle football outside North America, is a competitive team sport known for combining strategy with physical play. The objective of the game is to score points by advancing the ball into the...
program from Division I FCS (formerly I-AA) to Division I FBS (formerly I-A). The
Western Kentucky UniversityWestern Kentucky University is a public university in Bowling Green, Kentucky, USA. It was formally founded by the Commonwealth of Kentucky in 1906, though its roots reach back a quarter-century earlier....
Board of Regents approved this move in November 2006, to take effect in 2009. At the time of the vote, WKU was purportedly out of Title IX compliance because it had a disproportionately large number of female scholarship athletes. By upgrading football, it increased the percentage of male athletes on scholarship However, the following year, it eliminated its men's soccer team.
Impact
It is difficult to characterize the impact of Title IX on athletics in an unbiased way. Advocates cite increases in female athletic participation. Critics note that such increases might have occurred in the absence of legislation.
A 2008 study of intercollegiate athletics showed that women's collegiate sports has grown to 9,101 teams, or 8.65 per school. The five most frequently offered college sports for women are, in order: (1) Basketball, 98.8% of schools have a team, (2) Volleyball, 95.7%, (3) Soccer, 92.0%, (4) Cross Country, 90.8%, and (5) Softball, 89.2%.
Controversy
Title IX has been a source of controversy in part due to claims that Title IX has contributed to the reduction of programs for male athletes.
Commission on Opportunity in Athletics
On June 27, 2002, Secretary of Education
Rod PaigeRoderick Raynor "Rod" Paige , served as the 7th United States Secretary of Education from 2001 to 2005. Paige, who grew up in Mississippi, built a career on a belief that education equalizes opportunity, moving from college dean and school superintendent to be the first African American to serve as...
announced the creation of the Commission on Opportunity in Athletics (COA), a blue-ribbon panel to examine ways to strengthen enforcement and expand opportunities to ensure fairness for all college athletes. Co-chairs for the COA were
Cynthia CooperCynthia Lynne Cooper-Dyke is a retired American basketball player who has won championships in college, the Olympics, and in the Women's National Basketball Association . She is considered by many as one of the greatest women's basketball players ever...
and Ted Leland. The purpose of the Commission was to collect information, analyze issues, and obtain broad public input directed at improving the application of Federal standards for measuring equal opportunity for men and women and boys and girls to participate in athletics under Title IX. Sports scholarships between men and women must be equal.
The panel held four town hall meetings (in Atlanta, Chicago, Colorado Springs, and San Diego) to allow the general public to comment on the past, present, and future of Title IX. On February 26, 2003 the COA issued its final report. The COA provided twenty-three recommendations to the Secretary of Education. Although many of the recommendations were unanimous, some of the more controversial recommendations passed by an 8-5 vote. These dealt with considering non-scholarship athletes in prong one of the three-part test for compliance and allowing interest surveys to determine compliance with prong three. On the same day, Secretary of Education Rod Paige announced he would only consider the unanimous recommendations, which provided that the Department of Education (1) reaffirm its strong commitment to equal opportunity for girls and boys, women and men; (2) aggressively enforce Title IX in a uniform way across the nation; (3) give equal weight to all three prongs of the test governing Title IX compliance; and (4) encourage schools to understand that the Department of Education disapproves of cutting teams in order to comply with Title IX.
Similar U.S. state laws
Because Title IX only addresses public and private schools that receive federal funding, several states have enacted similar laws to prohibit discrimination based on sex regardless of whether the school receives federal funding. The states are: Alaska, California, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Washington, and Wisconsin.