It’s a scenario that plays out all around Washington: A brand new, state-of-the-art, high school baseball facility is built on campus for boys, including covered dugouts, a lighted scoreboard, batting cages and storage lockers. In contrast, the girls are told there is no softball field for them; instead, the school has made arrangements for them to play at a local community park 15 minutes away. It has no dugouts, scoreboard, batting cages or storage space. The girls must change in the portable toilets and the field itself is inferior to the one provided for the boys.
Our nation has made significant progress toward equal treatment for female athletes. From swimming and basketball to soccer and even boxing, girls and young women are participating in sports in increasing numbers. But as the all-too-familiar scenario above highlights, we have yet to realize the goal of equity. Too often, the facilities and other conditions for girls are not comparable to those for their male counterparts.
That’s why the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington has joined with the Women’s Sports Foundation to launch a campaign called “V is for Victory. So is IX.” The campaign is educating athletes, parents, coaches and administrators about the need for fair treatment of girls and women, and about the legacy of the federal Title IX law in promoting fairness. Across the state, the ACLU is participating in panel discussions, distributing informational booklets, facilitating workshops and promoting an interactive website with a viral video.
Promoting equity recognizes that sports are important for girls. Those who participate in athletics have higher self-esteem, greater academic success and increased success in the workplace. They are less at risk for obesity, smoking cigarettes, abusing drugs, entering into abusive relationships and getting pregnant.
Equity in Schools
In 1972, Congress enacted a landmark law known as Title IX that has had a major impact in ensuring equal access for female athletes in public schools. Title IX bans discrimination based on sex in any education program or activity receiving federal money. As a result of this law, the past three decades have seen an upsurge in opportunities for female athletes. The number of girls participating in high school sports has increased tenfold, from less than 300,000 to almost 3 million. The number of girls participating in college sports has increased fivefold.
Nonetheless, male athletes still enjoy many more opportunities to participate in both high school and college sports. More slots are open for boys and more operating money goes to boys’ athletics. Not one state — Washington included — is providing athletic opportunities to its female athletes in numbers that are proportionate to their enrollment. And facilities for girls’ teams are often inferior to those available for boys’ teams.
For example, a league of 10 schools in Washington recently planned to move its girls’ basketball program from winter to fall so that the boys’ basketball teams could have exclusive use of their schools’ gyms during the winter. The move also would have moved the girls’ soccer season from fall to winter, leaving the girls to play outside in inclement weather. Fortunately, the ACLU intervened and the district changed its plans.
A key feature of the campaign provides people with tools to advocate for equal treatment of girls and women in sports. The ACLU is offering free “Tying the Score” workshops for coaches, school administrators and parents throughout Washington. The workshops aim to improve awareness, identify concerns, and provide simple and cost-effective solutions to gender inequities in school sports.
Workshops can be tailored to meet communities’ specific interests and needs, and the ACLU brings them to people where they live. The workshops are facilitated by Linda Mangel, whose experience includes several years as an attorney for the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights.
Participants learn how to determine whether their school is meeting Title IX’s standards of equal treatment for boys and girls:
- Facilities should be equally well-equipped, maintained and accessible.
- Equipment and uniforms should be of the same quality.
- The numbers of games and practices for boys and girls should be comparable.
- Schedules should be comparable so that boys and girls have the same number of games in “prime time.”
- Programs and events should receive comparable support from cheerleaders, pep bands, school announcements and school newspapers.
- The number and experience of coaches should be comparable.
Schools could be out of compliance with these standards for any number of reasons. Some schools have inadequate policies, others have inadequate enforcement of policies and still others, unfortunately, deliberately discriminate. All the disparities, however, can be fixed without litigation — especially if there’s an effective, transparent policy known to everyone in the school community.
Fair Play in Community Sports
Title IX applies to public schools. But boys and girls play in community leagues as well, and unequal access is a problem there, too. Girls and women who play in these leagues frequently are relegated to the worst-maintained fields, the most undesirable practice or play times, and the least experienced officials. What’s needed is a guarantee that the standards of Title IX are applied to community athletics programs.
The ACLU of Washington, the Women’s Sports Foundation, the Northwest Women’s Law Center and NOW of Washington are supporting legislation that would require local government agencies to ensure that male and female athletes are treated fairly. Sponsored by Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles (D-Seattle) and Rep. Christine Rolfes (D-Kitsap), the legislation would strengthen and clarify state law providing for equity in government-funded community recreation programs and facilities.
Policymakers in Washington can look to a model law that California enacted in 2004. The legislation provides girls and boys equal opportunities in community youth athletics through equal allocation of city and county resources. It identifies factors for a court to evaluate in determining whether discrimination exists in local sports programming, i.e., whether the programs effectively accommodate the athletic interests and abilities of both genders. The factors include the provision of locker rooms, equipment and supplies; the scheduling and location of games and practice times; the opportunity to receive high-quality coaching; and the manner of providing publicity.
Sports equity advocates in California also developed some effective strategies for implementing the law. Cities throughout the state adopted policies that mobilized communities to promote fair play for all athletes. Mayors, department heads, city managers and other administrators reviewed policies, identified and fixed inequities, and showed how to conduct programs free of discrimination. Parks and recreation departments reached out to their communities to enlist program champions, such as fathers of girl athletes. And schools and community leagues formed partnerships, so that each could gain from the other.
We can do that here in Washington. While we’ve made a lot of progress toward equal treatment of males and females in athletics, we’re not yet where we need to be. We need to ensure that both male and female athletes get a fair chance.
Sarah Dunne is Legal Director of the ACLU of Washington.
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