Bigger Than Sports: Why Title IX Matters

Patsy Mink had always dreamed of becoming a doctor, but none of the 20 medical schools she applied to accepted women. Edith Green wanted to become an electrical engineer, but her family told her "not to be silly." Bernice Sandler, teaching part-time at a university after earning her doctorate, learned that her department would not consider her for a full-time position because she "[came] on too strong for a woman."

These three women, carrying with them personal experiences of discrimination, came together in the early 1970s to help create the first legislation specifically prohibiting sex discrimination in education: Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.

Sandler, an education specialist with the U.S. House of Representative's special subcommittee on education, spent a couple of years lobbying, filing lawsuits and gathering data -- with the support of many feminist organizations -- until she convinced Rep. Edith Green (D-Ore.) to hold the first congressional hearings on sex discrimination in education. Two years later, Green, with the support of Rep. Patsy Mink (D-Hawaii) and others, introduced Title IX, which passed through Congress with little attention and was signed into law by President Richard Nixon.

Though the word "sports" does not appear anywhere in Title IX, the law has become synonymous with increased opportunities for girls in athletics. But this is only a small part of the story: Title IX also played the pivotal role in opening doors to educational opportunities for girls and women in all areas of education, from kindergarten through graduate school.

Every time a girl fixes an engine in auto shop, bubbles in her answers on a less-biased SAT, or successfully files a complaint to stop sexual harassment, she has Title IX to thank. "Before Title IX, if you were discriminated against all you could do is maybe transfer to another school -- if they'd let you," says Sandler, considered the "godmother" of the law. "Title IX [allowed students to] say, 'This is not only wrong; this is illegal.'"

Here are some of the K-12 advances that can be attributed to Title IX:

• Girls' participation and achievement in math and science has increased substantially.
• Discrimination against girls and teachers who become pregnant has decreased.
• All areas of vocational education have been opened to both sexes.
• Sexual harassment in schools is now clearly illegal.
• The PSAT and SAT have become less biased against girls.

In colleges and graduate schools, the impact of Title IX has been even more remarkable. Just before Title IX was signed into law, women were underrepresented as undergraduates, at just over 40 percent of all students. By 2005, women students comprised almost three out of five undergraduates and had moved into fields formerly dominated by men, particularly business and the sciences.

In graduate and professional schools, too, young women have enjoyed far greater access: In 1970, women earned only 14 percent of doctoral degrees, but today earn nearly half. In medical schools the numbers jumped from less than 10 percent to nearly 50 percent, and law school numbers from about 7 percent to nearly 49 percent. Armed with their professional degrees in medicine and law, women have entered those professions at steadily increasing rates.

Yet their numbers -- and in law firms, their advancement -- still lag behind. In 2006, women made up 29 percent of lawyers but just 16 percent of partners in law firms. Similarly, in medicine only 27 percent of doctors are women, and they're unevenly spread across specialties.

The news is also mixed about women in academic leadership. By 1986 the number of women college presidents had tripled from 1970 to almost 10 percent, and by 2006 reached 23 percent, with a large proportion serving as presidents of community colleges. But most of the progress occurred between 1986 and 2001 and now has slowed considerably. Furthermore, today's presidents remain much less diverse by race, gender and ethnicity than the students, faculty or administrators who report to them: Only 4 percent of the respondents in a recent survey of college presidents identified as "minority women."