LEGAL CONCEPTS IN SPORTS



Legal Concepts in Sports

Legal Concepts in Sports

The Policy Interpretation issued in 1979 by the OCR was designed to provide higher education institutes with a set of detailed instructions on how to fulfill the requirements of Title IX (www.law.uoregon.edu). The OCR's stated purpose in issuing the Policy Interpretation was to “grant an agenda within which the objections can be decided, and to provide foundations of higher education with supplementary regulation on the requirements for conformity with Title IX in intercollegiate athletic competitions.” The OCR's Policy Interpretation was meant only to explain the significance of “equal opportunity” reliable with Title IX Regulations (www.law.uoregon.edu). However, the Policy Interpretation has become one of the most powerful and controversial components of Title IX compliance. As one commentator has suggested:

Title IX was initially introduced by elected diplomats and was considerably changed seven years later through the Policy Interpretation, by unelected, anonymous civil servants, unaccountable to the public at large. As a result, a statute that had been designed to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex was now transformed by the Policy Interpretation into an affirmative action law that mandated gender quotas (www.law.uoregon.edu).” It has also been recommended that the Policy Interpretation was a calculated attempt by the OCR to amend the directives and to bypass the legislative-veto method. Regardless of the motives behind the actions of the OCR the fact remains that Congress never reviewed what would become one of the most controversial components of Title IX. The Policy Interpretation suggested three requirements that must be followed to avoid a violation of Title IX. The three parts include (1) compliance in financial assistance (scholarships) based on athletic ability; (2) compliance in other program areas; (3) compliance in meeting the interests and abilities of male and female students (addressing factor one from ...