TERRE HAUTE —
Title IX seems like a no-brainer in 2012.
The concept of equal access, regardless of gender, to educational programs receiving federal funds appears obvious. Anything less would be unfair.
Yet, until advocates in Congress pushed for that equality law, far fewer opportunities awaited women than men. Before President Nixon signed Title IX into law 40 years ago Saturday, only one of every 27 high school girls played organized sports; today, it’s close to two in five. Just 7 percent law degrees and 9 percent of medical degrees went to women before 1972; today, nearly half of those diplomas go to women. Less than 10 percent of veterinary students were women; today, they comprise 80 percent of those college programs.
And, in the high-profile arena of college sports, the number of female student-athletes has jumped 600 percent, from 30,000 to 186,000.
Clearly, there was a time when equal access was not a given.
Thus, the 40th anniversary of the landmark Title IX law is an appropriate moment to celebrate its door-opening virtues and reflect on those who pioneered its passage. The primary driver of the legislation grew up right here in Vigo County, raised by a father who coached at Indiana State Normal College (now ISU) and told his son “little girls need strong bodies to carry strong minds around in, just like little boys.” Birch Bayh, the Shirkieville-born U.S. senator, steered Title IX through contentious public debates full of often wildly exaggerated predictions of doom. (Sounds a lot like Congress today, but we digress.)
In hindsight, we are thankful Bayh and others stood firm. That wasn’t easy. Though Nixon signed the law in 1972, its day-to-day details didn’t become a reality until his successor, Gerald Ford, put his signature on the fine-tuned Title IX in 1975. At one point, both Ford and Bayh were lobbied hard by college football icons, such as Alabama coach Paul “Bear” Bryant, who claimed Title IX would destroy the game. Of course, it did not.
Title IX did, though, yield some unintended consequences. As colleges made choices to comply with the law and offer women equal access to athletic scholarships, sports opportunities, and sports facilities and prime-time practice and game slots, many of those schools eliminated men’s sports to balance the male-female ratio. Those with the most revenue potential — men’s basketball and bowl-caliber football — remained, while so-called “minor” sports got the ax. Since ’72, 475 colleges have dropped their varsity wrestling teams, including ISU.
Troubling as those losses are, new doors are opening in that very same sport, thanks to Title IX. The number of girls on high school wrestling teams jumped 20 percent in the 2010-11 school year. Twenty-five years ago, only one girl in America suited up as a high school wrestler. Prep wrestling’s recent growth spurt, long after Title IX, may be reviving that sport at higher levels, too. Thirteen colleges now field women’s wrestling squads, and women’s freestyle wrestling joined the roster of Olympic sports in 2004.
The successes of Title IX are countless and refreshing. Among the many sterling examples are two young women from the Wabash Valley competing in the U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials this weekend at Eugene, Ore. Pole vaulter Kylie Hutson and 800-meter runner Erica Moore got their starts at Terre Haute North Vigo and Sullivan high schools, and then ISU. Their Olympic dreams are rooted in the efforts of all those who led the call for equality 40 years ago.
Happy anniversary, Title IX.
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Editorial: At age 40, a hearty toast to Title IX
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