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Women 9, men 0.(Tilting the Playing Field: Schools, Sports, Sex, and Title IX)(Book Review)
Tilting the Playing Field: Schools, Sports, Sex, and Title IX By Jessica Gavora Encounter Books, 181 pages, $24.95
A cross the country, programs such as men's wrestling and track have been disappearing at the rate of a half-dozen every month, having fallen prey to a bizarre twist of education policy emanating from Washington.
It's called Title IX, a 1972 statute that ostensibly bars gender discrimination in federally funded education. Well-meaning in theory, its interpretation by the Clinton administration in the 1990s has led to the carnage of men's teams. Campus athletics administrators, wary of enforcers at the Education Department's Office of Civil Rights and fearing a withdrawal of federal funds for their college, have eliminated men's teams in order to make the proportion of male to female athletes on their teams mirror the gender proportions within the student body. These quotas have forced men off teams and shut down entire male squads, while women's teams for which there was no demand have been started up to balance the numbers.
Parity-through-amputation is perhaps the best known of the Title IX vagaries, and it is now being investigated by a commission set up under President Bush. Many more results of Title IX have been adeptly chronicled by Jessica Gavora, chief speechwriter and a senior policy advisor to John Ashcroft.
As Gavora explains in Tilting the Playing Field, the most harm has been done by aggressive interpretations of Title IX that go far beyond the statute's intent. Consider how the statute has been used in cases of alleged sexual harassment of children and teenage girls. Gavora points out that while sexual harassment is not even mentioned in Title IX, it has served as the basis of many successful legal actions under the law.
The most eye-popping is the case of Jonathan Prevette, a six-year-old suspended from his North Carolina school after kissing a female classmate on the cheek. Then there's the Indiana elementary school that banned fourth graders from playing "boys chase the girls" at recess, on the grounds that the age-old game constituted sexual harassment. These actions, among others, followed on the heels of a "policy guidance" issued by the Clinton Education Department's Office of Civil Rights. Among other school actions that followed the guidance, according to Gavora: Nicholas ...
- Spoiled Sports.(Tilting the Playing Field: Schools, Sports, Sex, and Title IX)
- Magazine article from: National Review LOPEZ, KATHRYN JEAN July 1, 2002 700+ words
Tilting the Playing Field: Schools, Sports, Sex, and Title IX, by Jessica Gavora...law known as "Title IX." Jessica Gavora...The same year Title IX was passed -- 1972...author of Tilting the Playing Field, was playing fourth...
- A SPORTING CHANCE; 30 YEARS AGO TITLE IX LEVELED THE PLAYING FIELD FOR WOMEN...
- Newspaper article from: The Post-Standard (Syracuse, NY) February 5, 2002 700+ words
...will commemorate the 30th anniversary of Title IX, for National Girls and Women in Sports Day. Title IX, passed on June 23, 1972, paved the way for...Cortland State to participate in style. Title IX of the Education Amendments prohibited sex discrimination...
- TITLE IX STARTS NEW SPORTS CHAPTER MILESTONE LAW ENGENDERS A MORE LEVEL PLAYING...
- Newspaper article from: Rocky Mountain News (Denver, CO) Folstad, Rick November 7, 1999 700+ words
...s sports forever. It was called Title IX and it was designed to bring equity to women...receiving federal money. ``The law, Title IX, did not cause women to succeed,'' President...my junior and senior years (after Title IX began to kick in), we would take flights...
- RALLY CELEBRATES 30 YEARS OF TITLE IX SPEAKERS SAY WOMEN HAVE MADE STRIDES IN...
- Newspaper article from: Wisconsin State Journal (Madison, WI) Ingersoll, Brenda October 29, 2002 700+ words
...Ingersoll Wisconsin State Journal Title IX, a federal law has given rise to new women...this week. Much has changed since Title IX became law in 1972. The percentage of medical...told the group. Passed in 1972, Title IX bans sex discrimination in academics or...
- IS TITLE IX EQUAL TO TASK? 30 YEARS AFTER LAW'S ENACTMENT, PLAYING FIELD NOT...
- Newspaper article from: Rocky Mountain News (Denver, CO) Berger^, Jody June 15, 2002 700+ words
...ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS Thirty years after Title IX was created to outlaw sex discrimination...there gender equity? Not exactly. Title IX, created June 23, 1972, addresses all...like Ted Leland at Stanford.'' Title IX mandates equity in three areas: participation...
- Parity on the Playing Field.
- Magazine article from: School Administrator SOMMERFELD, MEG November 1, 1998 700+ words
...Parental Activists While Title IX issues have received widespread...the first high school Title IX lawsuit in Oklahoma, but seven...concerns about equity on the playing field than previous generations...to a wave of post-Title IX parents, with mothers who were...
- Leveling the Playing Field: How the Law Can Make Sports Better for...
- Magazine article from: Michigan Law Review Cole, Elsa Kircher May 1, 2001 700+ words
LEVELING THE PLAYING FIELD: HOW THE LAW CAN...Press. 2000. Pp. ix, 351. Cloth...book, Leveling the Playing Field: How the Law Can...Gary Roberts (p. ix). Indeed, the...law in Leveling the Playing Field is evident by a quick...
- A Playing Field Level for All
- Newspaper article from: The Washington Post October 1, 1995 700+ words
...Losers on the Level Playing Field" {Outlook, Sept...Congress enacted Title IX, but women's participation...proportionality test in Title IX enforcement. Schools...to comply with Title IX but need either to show...men's sports. The playing field needs to be level and...
