TITLE IX

Title IX

Title IX

Introduction

Title IX was a very monumental piece in 1972 when it was first released. This piece of federal legislation made it a violation to have gender inequalities in any form of education, or program that receive federal funding. This document has brought about many positives; the main one being that it has brought overall more equality to women. I am in no way shape or form arguing that equality is a bad thing, but the way that equality is being measured has caused many issues, especially in the very grey area of athletics. The majority of issues that Title IX has brought to the sports world is due to the area of spending (Thro & Snow, 1998). There is no right, wrong, or fair way to incorporate athletics into Title IX, but the way that it is written up has created and overcompensation and brought about some unfair consequences for men's athletics. The goal was to equal out the distributions of wealth for both male and female athletic teams, in which doing so only female programs have benefitted from. I feel as though if Title IX was reworked to better support all of the athletic teams, instead of the big money makers and their “sister” sports. The reality is that all athletic programs are not equal, and the whether they are male or female sports have nothing to do with it (Beveridge, 1996).

Discussion

No one would argue that equality is a right. Very few people would oppose any legislation that provided equal rights for all people. Likewise, the overall objective of Title IX is providing the same benefits for women as are provided for men. This in itself is worthy and right in America. Why should colleges, universities, schools and any public or government-supported institution provide more for one sex than another? This is discrimination no different than providing for one race over another. The fight for equality had lead to Title IX, which was part of the Education Amendments of 1972. Title IX was put in place to protect people from discrimination based on sex in education programs or activities that receive federal funding (Coakley, 2001). This amendment states that “no person in the United States shall on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or activity receiving federal financial assistance.” Title IX changed a lot of things in a positive manner, but the way that this amendment has changed athletics has been controversial for many years. Funding has always been an issue in athletics, and the problem has increased in later years with our down economy. This problem has lead to many athletic programs, mainly wrestling, being dropped around the country. If Title IX was to be reworked to better assess the needs of the athletic programs, I feel as though the issue of funding would greatly decrease and, therefore, lead to schools being able to keep all of their sports teams (Greendorfer, ...