NWLC Analysis Ranks States on Lack of Opportunities for Girls to Play High School Sports

As Title IX Turns 40, NWLC also launches web portal putting human face on landmark law

(Washington, D.C.)  Forty years after the passage of Title IX, girls still receive 1.3 million fewer opportunities than boys to play high school sports.  A state-by-state ranking released today by the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) (http://www.nwlc.org/resource/next-generation-title-ix-athletics) shows that in the majority of states, at least 25 percent and as many as 75 percent of schools report very large participation gaps between the percentage of girls enrolled and the percentage of female athletes, which reflects serious limitations on girls’ chances to play on teams and raises critical questions about Title IX compliance. The ranking is based on the percentage of high schools in the state reporting a participation gap of 10 percentage points or higher.

The bottom ten-ranked states have the largest percentage of high schools with participation gaps of 10 percentage points or more: Georgia, 71.6 percent; Tennessee, 65.4 percent; Louisiana, 62.2 percent; Alabama, 62.2 percent; South Carolina, 61.4 percent; Texas, 59.4 percent; the District of Columbia, 57.1 percent; North Carolina, 54.9 percent; Mississippi, 53.9 percent; Arkansas, 49.6 percent, and Arizona, 41.2 percent.

During the 2010-2011 school year, 3.2 million girls played high school sports, compared to 4.5 million boys who did. That number shows both how successful Title IX has been, but also how much further there is to go. In 1972, the year Title IX banned sex discrimination in federally funded education programs, 295,000 girls and 3.67 million boys competed in high school sports. “As Title IX turns 40, we celebrate how far the law has brought us toward gender equity in education, but girls across the country still don’t get equal opportunities to play sports,” said NWLC Co-President Marcia D. Greenberger.

Although Title IX is best known for breaking down barriers in sports for women and girls, it also opens the door for girls to pursue math and science, requires fair treatment for pregnant and parenting students, and protects students from bullying and sexual harassment, among other things. NWLC today released analyses of girls’ status in all these areas (http://www.nwlc.org/title-ix/resources).

NWLC today also launched “Faces of Title IX,” an online portal featuring nine diverse stories that put a human face on the wide-ranging impact of the law (http://www.nwlc.org/title-ix). “‘Faces of Title IX’ looks beyond statistics to powerfully capture how the law has helped real people,” said Greenberger. “These vivid accounts illustrate both the enormous progress we’ve made and the work that remains to reach the full promise of Title IX.”

Stories include:

• Shree Bose served as captain of her high school’s swim team while developing an innovative approach to treating ovarian cancer;
• Julia Chase Brand rocked the boat in 1961 when she ran the previously all-male Manchester Road Race and advanced long-distance running for women in the United States;
• Bobby Brugger discovers Title IX after her teenage daughter is bullied and harassed in middle- school while teachers passively watch;
• Dr. Alexa Canady, the first African-American pediatric neurosurgeon, skillfully navigated a male-dominated profession;
• Sarah Egan undertakes the challenge of her life when she agrees to coach a middle-school girls’ basketball team;
• Lawrie Mifflin, the first woman sports reporter at the New York Daily News, witnessed the dramatic expansion of girls and women playing sports competitively.
• Lisette Orellana recalls becoming invisible as a 15-year-old “A” student who was isolated and ignored by teachers after she became pregnant;
• Karyn Ridgeway taps into the skills she gained as a college basketball player as she handles life-threatening crises in the ER;
• Daniell Washington transmits her knowledge and passion of the ocean to kids in urban Miami, introducing them to the vast universe in their own backyards.

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