News Page
Discussions during the next few weeks will determine changes to the law.
Gannett News Service
December 22, 2002
A commission appointed by the Bush administration is poised to propose profound changes in Title IX, the federal law that forbids sex discrimination at schools and universities receiving federal funds.
The Commission on Athletic Opportunity has gotten relatively little attention, though it does its work in public and its proposals could reverberate at virtually every educational institution in the country.
The 15-member commission held a meeting in Philadelphia two weeks ago at which members offered broad outlines of the kinds of changes they would like to see, especially in how the underlying regulations of Title IX apply to college sports. What emerged was a clear consensus to recommend new rules for enforcement of Title IX at its meeting Jan. 8.
The notion of any change in the law that revolutionized women’s sports has fueled anger among women’s groups. A coalition of groups met Wednesday in Washington at the Leadership Council on Civil Rights to plan protests when the commission meets to vote on its proposals in preparation for its final report, due Jan. 31. The National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education had a teleconference Thursday to brief reporters on what it called bias and flaws in commission work.
These next few weeks will be crucial ones behind the scenes at the Department of Education, where staff members are putting flesh and bone to the broad-stroke proposals commission members floated two weeks ago. Time remains for coalitions to form behind particular proposals, though commissioners are limited in how much they can do by e-mail and phone as all commission meetings, by law, must be public.
Several proposals center on changing the principle of proportionality, which says the percentage of a school’s athletes who are female should mirror the percentage of women in the student body. If a college is 56 percent female — the national average — then about 56 percent of its athletes should be women.
Sports for women and girls have become a part of the national culture since Title IX’s passage in 1972. About 2.7 million girls play high school sports — nine times more than in 1971. The number of women in Division I college sports has grown from 26,461 when the NCAA took over women’s sports in 1981 to 62,677 in its most recent count. More males still play at both levels: 3.9 million in high school and 84,284 in Division I colleges.
Title IX has led to an increase not only in numbers but in talent and interest — to the rise of stars such as Mia Hamm and the formation of professional sports leagues such as the Women’s National Basketball Association and Hamm’s Women’s United Soccer Association
But advocates of lower-profile men’s sports such as wrestling fault Title IX for forcing the elimination of more than 400 men’s teams as colleges tried to balance the numbers of male and female athletes.
Women’s groups cry foul on this point: They say most colleges that add women’s teams do not drop men’s teams. But the Bush administration has listened carefully to the advocates of men’s teams.
It appears likely the administration will embrace some form of the proposals to make proportionality more flexible. President Bush campaigned against “strict proportionality” when he ran in 2000. Education Secretary Rod Paige charged the commission with assessing whether Title IX works to promote opportunities for male athletes as well as for females.
’Sky is the limit’
“There is almost a sky-is-the-limit sense to the proposals” being discussed by the commission, says Marcia Greenberger, co-president of the National Women’s Law Center. “It is shocking to see this commission throw out 30 years of progress in such a casual way.”
Many commission members see it far differently. Many are college administrators who say they know firsthand that the current rules are too difficult to understand and too often hurt men’s teams. Women’s groups say that’s nonsense — and that huge expenditures on football and men’s basketball are what hurt minor men’s sports and women’s sports alike.
The arguments are old ones. What’s new is the prospect of real change in rules that were written in 1979 and that courts have rendered bulletproof in a series of legal challenges since.
Title IX forbids sex discrimination in all programs at schools that get federal aid. Medical schools and law schools have long since complied. The continuing controversy is almost exclusively about how Title IX applies to sports, although the 35-word statute makes no mention of sports.
When St. John’s University in New York City dropped its small-time football program last week, it said one reason was that its female enrollment has risen to 58 percent. The decision was less about dollars than numbers: Under current regulations, one way St. John’s can comply with Title IX is to make sure that about 58 percent of its athletes are women — which is harder to do with a roster of 62 football players.
Critics of Title IX say proportionality is a quota. Proponents call it central to the meaning of the law. Critics say proportionality has been the blunt instrument used to kill about 170 wrestling teams. Proponents say if colleges with big-time football programs reduced their football scholarship limit from 85 to 60 and stopped paying coaches $1 million a year and more, they could easily afford wrestling and gymnastics teams.
Commission member Julie Foudy, captain of the U.S. women’s soccer team, suggested that the commission urge colleges to curb expenditures in the “arms race” in football and men’s basketball. Other commissioners objected that it would amount to an antitrust violation to suggest that salaries be held in check.
Several proposals tackled the lightning rod of proportionality, which is the first part of a three-part test that the Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights uses to measure whether a school meets Title IX’s participation requirements. A school must pass one part of the test to comply.
The first part is the by-the-numbers test that says the percentage of female athletes should be proportional to the percentage of women in the student body. No number on the books says how close a school should be, but courts have often pegged it as being plus or minus 1 percent.
The other tests are harder to measure: The second says a school must show a history and continuing practice of adding women’s sports. The third says a school must demonstrate that the athletic interests and abilities of the women on its campus are fully and effectively accommodated.
Defenders of Title IX say proportionality can’t be a quota because there are two other ways to comply with the law. Commission member Gene DeFilippo, the athletic director at Boston College, proposes that a new policy statement be drafted to clarify what each of the three tests means.
A 1996 clarification letter issued by the Department of Education referred to the first test as a “safe harbor.” Critics of Title IX say it has emerged as the safest way for a school to ensure it won’t be sued for discrimination. Commission member Deborah Yow, the athletic director at the University of Maryland, says lawyers at her school tell her to use the first test because the other two are too vague: “We need to be able to tell what the target is without legal degrees.”
The commission held four town meetings across the country and heard testimony from dozens of witnesses, including men who felt they had been denied opportunities by the unintended consequences of Title IX.
It was against this backdrop that commissioners sat around a large table in Philadelphia this month and offered their proposals on reform. No one suggested leaving Title IX alone, and several zeroed in on the first test:
Co-chair Ted Leland, the athletic director at Stanford University, proposed that a new test count “opportunities” rather than actual athletes as one way of determining proportionality. That way coaches of men’s teams could keep non-scholarship athletes, if they chose. His was the first of several proposals predicated on the notion that men have more interest in sports than women.
Maryland’s Yow suggested changing the proportionality rule so that male and female athletes be split 50-50 regardless of enrollment figures, and that “wiggle room” of 7 percent be built in. Under this formula, if a school’s female enrollment was 58 percent, it could still meet the first test if 43 percent of its athletes were female — 50 percent minus 7 percent.
“The idea that you can measure interest by undergraduate enrollment is not logical,” Yow says. “We don’t hold elementary ed and engineering schools to that standard.”
University of Iowa athletic director Bob Bowlsby proposed that participation rates in a given region’s high schools be used as a barometer for colleges. If 42 percent of the high school athletes are female, he suggested that colleges in that region be required to have 45 percent of their athletes be women — 3 percent better than the feeder system. Foudy counters the proposal would freeze discrimination in place.
New test for courts?
Brown University made similar arguments about differing levels of interest a decade ago in a landmark Title IX case — and lost. Courts have almost universally accepted the three-part test since it was introduced in 1979. What happens to the precedents in these cases if the principle of proportionality is substantially changed by the Bush administration?
Brian Jones, the Department of Education’s general counsel, says courts would have to decide cases based on the new rules — and there could well be different outcomes as a result. “The department could issue new regulations or a new letter of clarification,” Jones says.
Jeffrey Orleans, executive director of the Ivy League, was among those who helped write the original regulations in 1979. He says when the government drafts a reasonable interpretation of a statute, it leaves an opening for the government to change its mind. The key, he says, is whether new policies are reasonable interpretations.
Jocelyn Samuels, the National Women’s Law Center’s educational director, says courts would throw out new rules like those proposed. “That could take years,” she says. “It would be deeply unfortunate if we have to go down that road.”
Samuels is highly critical of the role played by ex-officio commission member Gerald Reynolds, assistant U.S. secretary of education for civil rights, whose job it is to enforce Title IX. Reynolds offered a proposal that rules be considered for private financing of college teams, citing a case in which Marquette University dropped its wrestling program though alumni were willing to pick up the cost.
“The Department of Education staff is not merely influencing the commission,” Samuels says, “but is actively pushing it in the direction of drafting new policies.”
Reynolds, who has a history of opposing gender and racial preferences, has been a controversial figure since Bush selected him. USA TODAY has requested an interview since before Reynolds was appointed in April. Reynolds agreed to an interview two weeks ago, but staff for the Department of Education later said he would not be available until after the commission completes its work.
Panel faces critics
What all this means for the law credited with revolutionizing women’s sports in the United States depends on whom you ask. Title IX proponents say the kinds of changes being discussed would amount to repeal of the law. Advocates of men’s minor sports say the proposals make good sense but don’t go far enough.
Michael W. Moyer, executive director of the National Wrestling Coaches Association, is in favor of what he calls “a common-sense approach to giving colleges more flexibility” in meeting Title IX. “But we had hoped to see proportionality abolished altogether.”
Moyer’s group is among a coalition of coaches that is suing the Education Department in an attempt to get the current Title IX regulations struck down. On the day in June that Paige named the commission, he said the place to settle complaints about Title IX was in an open forum rather than in the courts.
Advocates of Title IX immediately castigated the commission as proof that the Bush administration was out to roll back the law. Critics mostly held their fire during the summer and fall. “We wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt,” Samuels says.
The first real fireworks came last month. Women’s Sports Foundation executive director Donna Lopiano had publicly called the commission a sham and urged its members to resign. When Lopiano appeared as a witness at the fourth town hall meeting in San Diego, commission member Tom Griffith, general counsel at Brigham Young University, pointedly asked her to retract her contention. Lopiano pointedly refused.
The arguments are bound to get louder in the days and weeks ahead. That is the history of Title IX. “These are the same arguments we have heard for 30 years,” Greenberger says. “I think we could be entering a very unfortunate period of uncertainty.”
-----------------------------------------------
Title IX: Hear it roar
Legislation gave girls sporting chance
By ROSS BISHOFF
Sports Writer 12/22/02
GRANVILLE -- Granville senior point guard Morgan Wills is just as vocal, feisty and competitive as any of her male counterparts could ever hope to be when she steps on a basketball court.
Those characteristics, along remarkable talent and experience in basketball, caught the eye of Central Michigan University, where she will play basketball next year.
Hypothetically, what would Wills be like if she had grown up in the 1970s? More than likely she wouldn't be attending Central Michigan next year. She probably wouldn't take basketball so seriously and, perhaps, wouldn't even delight Granville faithful with so much as a dribble.
If Wills had grown up in the immediate years surrounding Title IX, which passed in 1972, who knows? Luckily, however, she can dodge the hypothetical.
"I don't know what I would do if I couldn't play sports," Wills said. "(Sports) keep not only girls, but everybody out of trouble. They do a lot for confidence, makes them more well-known in school and gives them more activities to do."
Indeed, female athletics at the high school level in Licking County are vastly different than they were 30 years ago.
"What's occurred is the female athletes have actually become athletes," said Granville volleyball and softball coach Susie Harrison. "They're competitive and committed to their sports."
Before Title IX, female athletics were confined to gym classes or intramurals. Consider Harrison -- a graduate of Berne Union in 1973 -- who played in the Girls Athletic League and remembers taping numbers on T-shirts to play sports.
Girls sports have gone from intramurals to fledgling teams to programs with feeders systems that start at the elementary school level.
"It took a while to grab hold," Newark girls basketball coach Dan Walters said. "People of my age viewed Title IX as a mandate -- that girls were this and boys were this. The kids who have grown up since then just think they should be equal."
When Title IX was passed in 1972, area schools immediately began instituting girls programs to match the boys. At Newark, then-Athletics Director Jim Allen, didn't hesitate to get the ball rolling.
"It took a lot of work and cooperation from our coaches," Allen recalls. "I wish it had passed earlier because we had a daughter who would have been a great shortstop."
While Newark had a girls basketball team before Title IX, it quickly added softball, track, tennis, swimming and volleyball for female athletes.
Allen then began scheduling for the new sports and made sure the girls had the same equipment and facilities.
"It was no great problem," Allen said. "We had a good physical education program that helped us prepare the kids, and we had all the facilities already."
Allen said most Licking County schools did the same. In fact, in Licking County it seems giving girls equal opportunities was rarely a debate.
"To be honest, I haven't encountered many negative things," said Licking Valley track coach Lori Guest, a 20-year Panther coach and teacher who graduated from West Muskingum in the mid-1970s.
Newark Catholic Principal Beth Hill began her 10-year volleyball coaching career in 1984 and led the team to three state titles. The Green Wave hold the state record with seven state championships.
"At Newark Catholic they saw the need and benefit of female athletics," said Hill, who also graduated from NC. "To see the quality of athletes that come through now is phenomenal."
Boys and girls have similar budgets, access to equipment and trainers and facilities. Newer schools such as Heath and Licking Valley even have auxiliary gyms in addition to the gymnasiums so volleyball teams and basketball teams can always have a place to practice.
Newark AD Kevin Jarrett said he has monthly meetings with his coaches to examine whatever is on their minds. One thing that has been brought up is expanding the Evans Athletic Complex.
Evans used to be for football players only. However, now it is used by football, girls and boys cross country teams and the soccer teams.
"I always ask our coaches to give me their best possible solution," Jarrett said. "We want to find a way to accommodate everyone."
While attitudes toward female athletics have changed, the evolution of the athletes themselves may be responsible for another phenomena -- the vast majority of coaches are men.
In the early years, women primarily coached girls' sports because it was an offshoot of the physical education program, meaning female gym teachers were the coaches.
But slowly the tide turned. In Licking County, of the more than 160 coaches, only 26 are women.
But that doesn't seem to reflect gender inequity. Many say that after a few years of coaching, women tend to give it up to raise a family.
"With a family it is hard," said Heath volleyball coach Shela Croom, who has three daughters. "You run to work and to your kids and to practice. I thought about getting out but my husband and mom convinced to keep doing it. You need family support."
Dan Walters' wife, Marjeanne, coached the Wildcats girls basketball team from 1971-80 before Dan took the job. Her last game was three days before she gave birth to daughter Courtney.
As men take over a program, they seem to stick with it longer, and, in some cases, prefer coaching girls.
Heath girls basketball coach Doug Griffin said girls listen to their coaches better than boys, and Granville coach Mike Workman said it is a much more fundamental style of play.
"Most guys always see themselves as boys coaches," Workman said. "They'll take a girls job to get some experience and then fall in love with it."
Even in volleyball, where the boys version is slowly growing, Harrison and Croom both said many more men are becoming officials and coaches.
"The programs have really blossomed and (it has) drawn the interest of men," Harrison said.
One area in which Title IX has come under severe scrutiny is in the wrestling community. At the college level, many wrestling teams are cut to adhere to Title IX's standards.
However, at the high school level Title IX hasn't had the same impact. According to Wrestling USA Magazine, participation in wrestling among girls and boys is up across the nation, even though collegiate scholarships have dwindled.
"A lot of times a kid is predetermined if he's going to wrestle in college," said Newark Catholic wrestling coach Brendan Courtot, who wrestled at Ohio University. "Usually someone planning to wrestle in college will find a way to."
At the college level there is always debate over how Title IX is carried out. But at the high school level, especially in Licking County, the mandate's initial purpose seems to have had the desired effects.
Just watch girls such as Wills or Stacy Vanover, a three-sport senior at Licking Valley, take a basketball court or a softball field.
"I've heard a lot of mothers talk about how we've gotten more aggressive," Vanover said. "We're more competitive now and can be pushed harder."
And after all that, amazingly enough, Title IX may not get the credit it deserves.
"Through the years I don't remember the term 'Title IX' being thrown around," Hill said. "It doesn't seem like it was a mandated effort. In this area, we looked at it as an opportunity."
----------------------------------------------
All in the Game
Critics charge that Title IX penalizes men
By Lisa O'Donnell 12/22/02
JOURNAL REPORTER
In 1971, a girl at Mount Tabor High School could play basketball or speedball. Today, she can run track, play golf or join any of the 11 sports teams that the school offers for girls, including the field-hockey team that started play this year. (Speedball, a hybrid of soccer, touch football and basketball, is no longer offered.)
Thirty years after its passage, Title IX remains a hot-button issue in athletics. The federal law was designed to ban sex discrimination in any educational institution that receives federal funds.
Proponents of the law argue that it unlocks the door for girls in the previously male-dominated world of athletics. Critics argue that the law creates a quota system that discriminates against male athletes in such sports as wrestling, swimming and gymnastics.
Title IX has led to an explosion of opportunities for female athletes.
In 1970, one in 27 girls played a high-school varsity sport. Today, one in 21/2 do, according to the National Federation of High Schools. The number of female athletes in college has swelled from 30,000 in 1971-72 to 150,916 in 2000-01.
The beneficiaries of Title IX include athletes familiar to most sports fans - soccer star Mia Hamm, basketball player Sheryl Swoopes and track standouts Marion Jones and Jackie Joyner-Kersee.
In North Carolina, Title IX has given thousands of middle-school and high-school girls a chance to compete in such sports as tennis, swimming, softball and volleyball. Female participation jumped from 32,884 in 1988-89 to 62,008 last year, according to the N.C. High School Athletic Association.
Among the local athletes who could serve as poster girls for Title IX are LaQuanda Barksdale (West Forsyth 1997), an All-ACC player in basketball for the University of North Carolina and now a member of the WNBA's Portland Fire; Laura Greene (Forbush 1999), a captain of the University of North Carolina volleyball team who is considering a career in coaching; and Samantha Murillo (Davie County 2001), a member of the Kansas State track team who hopes to compete in the Olympics.
All used their athletic abilities to help pay for their college educations.
Had these women grown up before Title IX, their lives likely would have taken different turns.
It took federal legislation, not a sudden shift in thinking by school administrators, to shake up the sports climate.
Barbara Osborne conducts seminars on Title IX at universities across the country. She compares Title IX with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which banned racial discrimination in public places.
"The Civil Rights Act stuck us with a cattle prod and made us think about race relations," said Osborne, an assistant professor in the Department of Exercise and Sport Science at the University of North Carolina. "And that is what Title IX has done. It has given the male stronghold in sports a cattle prod."
Title IX covers gender discrimination in all areas of education, including admissions and employment. Women once banned from certain law schools and medical schools can now gain admittance, thanks to Title IX. The law extends to extracurricular activities such as drama and band.
Title IX stirs the most controversy when it is applied to athletics.
"Title IX was never intended to be about athletics but about education," Osborne said. "Athletics was lumped in because it is part of the educational process. It is an extracurricular activity. They are sponsored by the school to enhance a student's education."
Under Title IX, schools must provide men and women the same opportunity to participate in athletics, distribute athletic scholarships equitably and provide equal treatment in such areas as promotion, facilities and compensation of coaches. Schools that violate Title IX risk losing federal aid.
Schools have three ways to show compliance - having the same percentage of women athletes as women enrolled as undergraduates; showing a history of expanding women's sports programs; or demonstrating that they have effectively accommodated the sporting interests of women attending the school.
These choices, often referred to as the "three-prong test," have become a highly controversial issue.
Schools struggle to meet the first prong of the test. In Division I colleges, women make up 53 percent of the undergraduate enrollment and 41 percent of the athletes.
At Wake Forest, in 2000-01, women made up 51 percent of the undergraduates and 38 percent of the athletes, according to statistics from the U.S. Department of Education.
Winston-Salem State also fails to meet the proportionality test. Women were 68 percent of the undergraduates and 34 percent of athletes.
"That's where we fall a little short," said Percy Caldwell, the athletics director at Winston-Salem State. "You have a large number of females out there and out of that large number those interested in athletics is not very high."
Critics of Title IX argue that the proportionality test creates a quota system that discriminates against males.
To raise the proportion of women in their programs, some schools have chosen to drop nonrevenue-producing male sports such as wrestling and gymnastics. Other schools have added women's sports.
Wake Forest has added two women's sports, soccer and volleyball, in the past eight years. In 1992, the school began providing scholarship money to its field-hockey team, which recently won the NCAA championship. Wake Forest has not dropped a men's team sport since 1979 when it cut wrestling.
The addition of those sports and the accompanying scholarships has helped Wake Forest come into compliance with Title IX. In 1997, the National Women's Law Center filed complaints against 25 schools, including Wake Forest and Duke, for failing to provide equal scholarship money to its female athletes.
Wake Forest resolved its complaint in 1999 after proving that the disparity in scholarship money was not a result of discrimination. The school had awarded several scholarships to women who then decided not to attend Wake Forest.
Duke also resolved its complaint in 1999 by agreeing to add 10 scholarships to its new women's rowing team.
Winston-Salem State recently dropped its men's and women's track teams because it didn't have the money or facilities to field competitive teams, Caldwell said.
The school recently added women's tennis and bowling for $80,000 a year. Caldwell said he had to take some money from men's basketball and football to pay for the new sports.
"When I see that expense, I don't say, 'Wow. Look at what Title IX did.' I say, 'Look at the planning we need to do,' Caldwell said.
Other schools have chosen to eliminate men's programs. The number of men's gymnastics teams among schools that belong to the NCAA has been slashed from 107 in 1979 to 20 today. According to the General Accounting Office, 131 wrestling programs were eliminated between 1981 and 1999. The GAO is an arm of Congress that investigates how tax money is spent.
P.J. Smith, the wrestling coach at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke, said that North Carolina schools fielded about 20 college wrestling teams in the early 1970s. Today, there are 10.
Smith, like other Title IX critics, argues that the proportionality test penalizes male athletes. He has two in-state scholarships, worth about $18,000 a year, to divvy among the 50 wrestlers on his team.
"People in women sports are running around giving scholarships to women already in school to keep them on the team," Smith said. "Here, we have a number of males wanting the opportunity to compete."
Smith said he believes that females don't share the same interest in sports as men, which makes the proportionality difficult to achieve.
"My own personal bias, and I know women disagree, is that men tend to be a little more aggressive and tend to participate more in sports," Smith said. "You watch little boys and they are kicking and beating and trying to tear it up. And girls are holding hands. I think we can't deny the differences between men and women."
Advocates of Title IX scoff at such a notion.
"Boys' sports have evolved so that there is a place for everybody. You find what you are good at and you participate in it," Osborne said. "It would stand to reason that girls' sports would evolve that way as well. You expand the opportunities. The inhibitor to that is that people running programs are mostly male and that sports in our culture is generally defined as male."
Schools that are unable to meet the proportionality test can comply with with one of the other "prongs." They can show that they have a history of adding female sports or prove that they are meeting the needs of the female population.
For North Carolina high schools, the state association routinely sends surveys to principals to gauge their interest in new sports. A certain percentage must approve adding a sport before it is certified by the association.
Since 1972, the NCHSAA has sanctioned six sports for girls and one for boys (indoor track in 1987). The most recent girls' sport added was fast-pitch softball in 1994.
In Forsyth County, girls' golf was added at Mount Tabor in 1997. Last year, field-hockey teams were started at Reynolds, West Forsyth and Mount Tabor. Those sports operate at club status. Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools gave each of the schools $5,000 for startup costs.
Jim Bovender, the director of athletics and physical education for the school system, said that money is available for other schools to start sports teams.
"Every school has the same opportunity," Bovender said.
Title IX also requires schools at all levels to treat women equitably in such areas as promotion, equipment and coaching.
Schools that provide cheerleaders for boys teams and not girls teams may be in violation of Title IX. So might schools that schedule banquets for a boys team and not a girls team.
The scheduling of games also falls under Title IX. At some schools, girls junior-varsity games can start as early as 4 p.m., which makes it difficult for working parents to see their daughters play. Boys often play later.
Parents are among the biggest supporters of equitable treatment.
"If you go to a ballgame and the girls' uniforms are old and raggedy and the boys' are new, light bulbs are going to go off and parents will ask questions," Bovender said. "You can't treat them any differently. It's got nothing to do with Title IX or what federal guidelines you're supposed to follow. You do what's fair for each child whether it's in the classroom or the athletic courts."
But Osborne says she believes that without the push from the federal government, female athletes' second-class treatment would have continued. She uses her experience as a high-school athlete as an example.
When she was a freshman in the mid-1970s, Osborne ran with the boys cross-country team because the school did not have a girls team. She routinely beat some of the boys, which upset their parents. At the request of the boys' parents, the school started a girls team.
"It wasn't because I asked but because the boys' parents didn't want me competing with the boys. They were embarrassed. And it was not the athletic director thinking, 'Gee. Let's create an opportunity for this girl.' That kind of attitude would have continued to exist. There would've been parental pressures to add things haphazardly," Osborne said. "I think girls sports would still be part-time whereas boys sports would be full time.... There would not be the variety of sporting options."
------------------------------------------------
Possible changes to Title IX has its supporters concerned
BY CORY REISS WASHINGTON BUREAU
12/22/02
WASHINGTON -- Nancy Benda says she can't explain why she was let go, but it could be a sign of the times.
On Dec. 6, the Florida Department of Education fired Benda, the director of the Equal Educational Opportunity Program for K-12 since 1979. A department spokesman said Benda was among 65 employees fired as a means of "aligning resources with the mission of the department and the Florida Board of Education and the governor."
Coincidentally or not, her ouster came just as a federal commission is considering major changes to Title IX, the 1972 gender equity law that has occupied much of Benda's time over the years. She said it could be part of broader changes in the air.
Florida is very, very closely aligned with Washington," she said.
The spokesman, Bill Edmonds, said Gov. Jeb Bush is not backing off racial and gender equality efforts but is reorganizing the department to be more efficient.
The federal Commission on Opportunity in Athletics, which President Bush formed to consider changes to Title IX, is considering sweeping recommendations that critics say would wreck the system that has boosted women's sports for 30 years.
Title IX has spawned thousands of women's athletics programs by barring gender discrimination in education and sports at schools that receive federal funds. It also has fueled countless arguments about what schools must do to comply.
Policymakers and athletic directors at universities and high schools are wrestling with basic questions as the commission considers options outlined at a Dec. 4 meeting in Philadelphia.
Have women come so far that the pressure to cap male athletic participation in school budgets can be eased? After 30 years of growing expectations among parents and their daughters, would schools dare to reverse course?
Benda was involved in nationwide Title IX compliance efforts that have worked in favor of women since 1972, although critics of Title IX say that has come at the expense of men's sports.
Nationwide, almost 2.8 million high school girls participated in sports in 2000-2001, almost 10 times the number in 1971, the year before Title IX was passed.
They are roughly 41 percent of all high school athletes.
At the college level, about 163,000 women played sports in the 1998-99 school year, an 81 percent increase from 1981-82, according to a General Accounting Office report.
But women still get fewer scholarships and other incentives, experts said.
Women's groups say that despite big gains, there should be no changes in Title IX.
"This will have devastating consequences for the rights of women and girls across the nation," said Jocelyn Samuels, vice president for education at the National Women's Law Center. "The playing field is not anywhere near level for them."
Benda isn't sure what her departure will mean for race and gender compliance and training in Florida's public schools, but she believes women have gone too far to be stopped.
"I feel we met the critical mass and that no matter what happens from the leadership, that young women and their parents now expect to have an equal opportunity," she said.
By 2000, the statewide sports gender gap between girls and boys in elementary through high school had been erased, although disparities still exist in some districts, according to federal data.
Ann Marie Rogers, an associate athletic director in charge of women's sports at the University of Florida, said Title IX should be left alone. But, she said, if it's not, women won't let their opportunities slip.
"The young women of today expect equal treatment," she said.
UF is 55 percent female, but women account for only 45 percent of its athletes. The school, however, says it is in compliance because one measure Title IX accepts is a history of efforts to open opportunities for women in sports.
Keith Carodine, another associate athletic director who is on UF's Title IX committee, said the rules are unclear and deserve review.
"I would hate to think we'd go backward," he said. "I would like to think people would be fair."
The federal commission agreed to consider an array of changes to Title IX at its next meeting Jan. 8.
It is not the law that is up for revision, but how the government interprets the goal of equal opportunity.
One proposal is to count team slots available to women and men instead of counting actual participation to determine compliance.
Under current interpretation, one of three ways to measure compliance is to compare the percentage of women enrolled with the percentage of women playing sports and see if they match.
Critics argue that the proposed change would give credit to schools that don't make efforts to recruit females to fill the opportunities they claim on paper.
Another plan would create interest surveys to gauge female interest in sports, integrating the results into a formula for deciding whether schools comply.
Paul Westfield, director of the Florida Amateur Wrestling Association, supports that idea.
He blames Title IX for forcing cuts in male sports, including all state university wrestling programs in Florida over the years, under assumptions that women are just as driven to join teams as men.
"Women don't have the same levels of interest in many cases as many men do," he said.
That line of thinking prompts women's groups to warn of a return to the days when girls were just encouraged to be cheerleaders.
"It reminds me of the days when women had to prove that they wanted to vote, that women had to prove that they wanted to own property, that women had to prove that they wanted to go to medical school," said Julie Foudy, a member of the federal commission who is president of the Women's Sports Foundation and captain of the U.S. National Women's Soccer Team.
"I think it is very dangerous," she said