Copyright 2002 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution  

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
August 30, 2002 Friday Home Edition
SECTION: Editorial; Pg. 21A

LENGTH: 572 words

HEADLINE: OUR OPINIONS: No reason strong enough for a Title IX takedown

SOURCE: AJC

BODY:
When Agnus Berenato graduated from high school in 1975 as an all-star athlete, there were virtually no sports scholarships for women. One of 10 children of a widowed mother, her only option was to go to France and play basketball professionally.

A few years later came a phone call from the women's basketball coach at the University of North Carolina, and, "He started talking to me about this thing called Title IX."

She came home, played brilliantly for UNC, became a coach and is now running the women's basketball program at Georgia Tech. She is paid as much as her male counterpart and coaches girls recruited from around the country with full scholarships.

"Basketball gave me everything in my life except my husband and children," she said.

She and other women and girls who finally have a chance to play sports and go to college are the reason why enforcement of Title IX must remain strong, despite challenges from some male athletes who claim they are being penalized by it.

This week, at a hearing on whether the enforcement of Title IX should be weakened, Berenato listened to a number of male wrestlers and their coaches lamenting that their college programs had been cut. Their universities had told them they were eliminating male athletes to keep the correct ratio with women athletes to comply with Title IX.

Indeed, the National Wrestling Coaches Association and others have filed suit against the U.S. Department of Education, claiming that Title IX requires quotas and that women are not as interested in sports as men. They want the federal government to eliminate a requirement that aims at having the ratio of women athletes reflect the ratio of women enrolled in the school.

The case is pending; meanwhile President Bush asked his education secretary to appoint a commission to study the effects of Title IX and consider whether the enforcement regulations should be changed.

They should not. The wrestlers' argument that they have suffered pales in comparison to the good Title IX has done for so many women and girls. It may be easier for a university to say Title IX required the cut, but there is nothing in the law or the enforcement guidelines that would require cutting men's teams. In fact, while Title IX helped increase the number of female athletes by more than 400 percent, the number of male athletes also rose by more than 20 percent.

Female athletes still represent only 70 percent of the number of male athletes, and for every dollar spent on women's athletics, $3 is spent on men's. Those colleges cutting male athletes are blaming high-level budget decisions on Title IX. The simple truth is, however, that those athletic departments are often funneling more and more money into big men's sports such as football and basketball.

Only 6 percent of high school athletes of either gender will get those precious spots on collegiate teams, those scholarships that so often make a college education possible. No reason is compelling enough to challenge the right of women to have an equal shot at those gems.

And if the president's commission comes back with a recommendation otherwise, he may find himself dealing with the fury of 52 percent of the voting public. Title IX helped many women play on high-school teams and go to college; their daughters are now playing high-school sports. Weakening support of this landmark law will not escape their notice.

LOAD-DATE: August 30, 2002