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Emily Thomas
ENG 1201
March 14, 2020

How is Title IX implemented in College Sports and who does it really benefit?

“Title IX prohibits the discrimination on the basis of sex for all educational programs and
activities that receive funding through the Federal Student Aid program and other federal
assistance programs” (“Title IX,” 2018). This act was implemented when the Education
Amendments Act of 1972 was passed that addressed every gender disparity in educational
programs and activities. There are several women’s leagues like National Women’s Soccer
League, Women’s National Basketball Association, softball league, National Women’s Hockey
League, Ladies Professional Golf Association and Women’s Tennis Association.

As stated in “Women in Professional Sports,” men tend to be physically stronger and

faster than women. Thus, male athletes are able to outperform their female counterparts in
popular professional sports like baseball, basketball, football, and hockey” (2019). This
statement shows little controversy because it did not say anything about soccer. For example, the
United States Women National Soccer Team (USWNT) just went through a time where they
were fighting about how they are getting paid less than the Men’s National Soccer (USMNT)
team and they have won the World Cup four times and the men haven’t made the World Cup in
years. The women ended up taking this situation to the supreme court and had won the right for
equal pay before men and women sports.

Many say that Title IX is the “women’s sports law” (Belanger, 2016). However, it is not
all for women, but it prohibits the discrimination based on sex in aspects of federally funded
programs and activities. People believe that it is inequality between men and women sports.
Belanger (2016) said, “But in the 1970s, the worlds of men’s and women’s college athletics were
completely separate and just as completely unequal making the idea of high-profile women’s
college sports hard for most people to imagine, and the demise of men’s bug-time sports
unlikely.” This aspect has changed now. Women’s sports are started to get more recognition in
their sports from both men and women. Title IX talks more about the inequality of all sexes
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In the study done by Reynolds (2018), she writes about the mobilization of Title IX
complaints that are filed and the kind of complaint over a ten-year period. In 2009, the rise of
academic and athlete complaints of equality began to take place. People did not think that
anything would change in sports and they would only file a complaint for most academics or
sexual assault cases. No one thought anyone would listen, so they did not speak up until 2009. In
Reynolds (2018), it states that, “a sharp increase in athletic complaints accounts for the more
recent spike, comprising 78 percent of the total filings in 2013 and 75 percent in 2014.”

  People think Title IX is just for women in sports, but it is much more than that. However,
most Title IX cases involve the inequality in women sports. The idea that “Title IX is only
powerful for women if there are stronger men’s sports” idea comes around due to the idea that it
only is for women athletes. Title IX regulates student interests and abilities, athletic benefits and
opportunities, and financial assistance which helps individuals in elementary to secondary school
systems, and to club and intramural athletic programs. In the “Equal Opportunity in
Intercollegiate Athletics,” it states, “a college or university is not required to offer particular
sports or the same sports for each sex.” Although, if a female would like to play a predominately
male sport, the school would have to allow it.

Discussion on my sources:

I added the source by Bell and “History of Title IX” because I believed that it was a good source
for the background of Title IX and how education and sports was perceived before the act was
signed. I added the movie, She’s the Man because I think the movie describes Title IX in a very
simple way. They show how a young lady would like to play soccer but cannot because the team
is getting cut from her school so the only way to prove herself on the field is to pretend to be her
brother and play soccer with males. A lot of the sources that I added were ones that I believe
were good for my counterargument.
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Works Cited

Bell, Richard. “A History of Women in Sport Prior to Title IX.” The Sport Journal, 12 Oct.
2016, thesportjournal.org/article/a-history-of-women-in-sport-prior-to-title-ix/.

Belanger, Kelly. Invisible Seasons: Title IX and the Fight for Equity in College Sports. Syracuse,
Syracuse University Press, 2016.

“Equal Opportunity in Intercollegiate Athletics: Requirements Under Title IX of the Education

Amendments of 1972.” Home, US Department of Education (ED), 10 Jan. 2020,
www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/interath.html.
“History of Title IX.” Women's Sports Foundation, 13 Aug 2019,
www.womenssportsfoundation.org/advocacy/history-of-title-ix/.

Reynolds, Celene. “The Mobilization of Title IX across U.S. Colleges and Universities, 1994-
2014.” Social Problems, vol. 66, no. 2, 2018, pp. 245–273., doi:10.1093/socpro/spy005.
She’s the Man. Dir. Andy Fickman. Amanda Bynes, Channing Tatum, and James Kirk.
Dreamworks, 2006. Film.

"Title IX." Gale Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2018. Gale In Context:
Opposing Viewpoints, https://link-gale-com.sinclair.ohionet.org/apps/doc. Accessed 21
Feb. 2020.

"Women in Professional Sports." Gale Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2019.
Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, https://link-gale-
com.sinclair.ohionet.org/apps/doc. Accessed 22 Feb. 2020.