When I found myself pregnant in August of 2010 it only took a quick calculation to realize the baby was due right smack in the middle of my Spring semester of my junior year of college. Everything was fine until the fourth week of class. I was 40 weeks pregnant, feeling like labor was imminent, and I had a midterm exam that night. After I finished the exam, I went home so that I wouldn’t go into labor in the middle of class. Later, I realized I had received only 5 out of 25 points for “Attendance & Participation” for that day. I emailed the professor asking if she planned to dock me the full 25 points for each class I missed for the birth, and she said ‘yes.’ I had two options: either risk failing the course while giving birth, or withdraw. I withdrew.
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We helped pass landmark health care reform legislation and end insurers’ practices of charging women higher premiums than men, excluding coverage for maternity care and treating domestic violence and Cesarean sections as pre-existing conditions.
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In response to a complaint filed by the National Women’s Law Center, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights found that girls in the Deer Valley Unified School District (AZ), the Wake County (NC) Public Schools, Columbus (OH) City Schools, the Houston Independent School District and the Irvine Unified School District (CA) are underrepresented in athletics programs.
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A coach in Birmingham, Alabama, Roderick Jackson was not afraid to speak his mind. When he witnessed the inferior practice and game conditions provided for his girls’ high school basketball team, compared to those provided for the boys, he complained to school administrators, calling it as he saw it: unfair sex discrimination.
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I worked at Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company for close to two decades. I was paid less than my male co-workers the entire time—even though I was doing the same work they were and doing it well. Near the end of my time there, I received an anonymous note alerting me to the discrimination, and I decided to fight for justice, with the help of the National Women's Law Center and its allies.
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