The NCAA News - News and Features

July 21, 1997

Woman recalls how five words led to creation of Title IX

The impetus for Title IX -- the law that prohibited sex discrimination in education and changed the course of women and girls in athletics -- was by some accounts set in motion by the words "too strong for a woman."

Those were the words that Bernice R. Sandler heard in 1969 as a young woman attempting to gain a faculty position at the University of Maryland, College Park.

Sandler, now a senior scholar in residence at the National Association for Women in Education (NAWE), cites those words with providing the catalyst to create Title IX legislation. Little did she know at the time that those five words would lead to Title IX and forever change the landscape of higher education and athletics.

Writing on the 25th anniversary of the adoption of Title IX in the spring issue of NAWE's newsletter,"About Women on Campus," Sandler tells the story of her attempt to get hired full-time at Maryland.

"The year was 1969," she wrote. "I had been teaching part time at the University of Maryland for several years during the time I worked on my doctorate and shortly after I finished it. There were seven openings in the department and I had just asked a faculty member -- a friend of mine -- why I was not considered for any of the openings. It was not my qualifications; they were excellent. 'But let's face it,' he said, 'You come on too strong for a woman.' "

Sandler said she thought back to the times she had spoken out at staff meetings with suggestions for improving procedures, about the times she had discussed teaching and professional issues with colleagues, and about participation in classes as a graduate student. "I accepted the assessment that I was 'too strong for a woman,' " she said.

Then, through conversations with her husband, Sandler determined that such a reason for not hiring someone was a form of sex discrimination.

"Like many women at that time, I was somewhat ambivalent about the women's movement and halfway believed the press descriptions of its supporters as 'abrasive,' 'man-hating,' 'radical' and 'unfeminine.' Surely I was not like that," Sandler wrote.

After rejections similar to the one at Maryland, Sandler said she began to seriously consider the ramifications of sex discrimination. Her study of the law found that sex-discrimination prohibitions did not apply to higher education. But she learned that a federal executive order prohibiting government contractors from discrimination in employment on the basis of color, race, religion and national origin had been amended by President Johnson in 1968 to include discrimination based on sex.

Under the auspices of the Women's Equity Action League (WEAL), Sandler embarked on a national campaign to end discrimination in education that eventually culminated in the passage of Title IX. She filed charges of sex discrimination against more than 250 colleges and universities and orchestrated a campaign of congressional letter writing to force the government to enforce its executive order.

Sandler noted that as Title IX legislation was developed in Congress, virtually no one noticed that the legislation would have a profound impact on athletics.

Rep. Martha Green of Michigan drafted legislation to prohibit sex discrimination in higher education. The first congressional hearings lasted seven days in June and July 1970.

Sandler wrote that no one from the official world of higher education testified, although they were invited to do so. A representative of the American Council on Education told counsel for the committee holding the hearings that "there was no sex discrimination in higher education," and if it did exist, it wasn't a "problem."

After the hearings, Sandler was hired by the Congressional Special Subcommittee on Education to create a written record of the hearings. Green had 6,000 copies of the two-volume hearing record printed and distributed to members of Congress, prominent organizations and individuals in higher education, and the media.

"The hearings probably did more than anything else to make sex discrimination in education a legitimate issue," Sandler wrote. "When administrators or faculty members would deny the existence of sex discrimination in academe, women (and men) could point out that this was not a frivolous issue and Congress itself had held days of hearings on this important issue."

As the legislation was being sponsored through the Senate by Birch Bayh of Indiana, questions about its effect on college athletics first arose.

"A few people noticed that athletics might be affected by the bill, so there was discussion on the floor of the Senate about whether the bill required educational institutions to allow women to play on football teams," Sandler said. "Having inserted that notion into the legislative history, higher education retreated, apparently unaware until much later that Title IX would have a profound impact on athletics, even if women were kept off football teams."

Concern also was expressed by institutions such as Harvard, Princeton and Yale Universities and Dartmouth College that they might have to admit women in equal numbers to men.

The institutions lobbied successfully for an exemption in the bill for private undergraduate admissions, "claiming that different sex ratios were best for learning, and individual institutions knew what the best ratios were," Sandler wrote.

While the amendment stood, Rep. Green made sure that once students of both sexes were admitted, there could be no discrimination against them, Sandler said.

"Because colleges and universities had only a rudimentary understanding of the problem of sex discrimination at the time, the higher education community apparently believed it had taken care of what they saw as the major impacts of the bill -- undergraduate admissions and football," Sandler writes.

As the legislation drew close to passage, a group of women (including Sandler) who represented women's organizations met with Green and offered their lobbying services. Sandler said Green told them it "would be better if we did not lobby because there was no opposition to the bill, and the less that people knew about it, the better its chances were for passage. We were skeptical, but she was absolutely right."

In spring 1972, two years after the hearings, a portion of Green's original bill became law when Title VII of the Civil Rights Act was amended in a separate action to cover all employees in educational institutions.

Green also sought to amend Title VI of the act, which prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, color and national origin in all federally funded activities. But at the urging of African-American leaders and others who feared that opening Title VI for amendment could weaken its coverage, Green proposed a separate and new title, which became Title IX.

On June 23, 1972, Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 was passed by Congress. It was signed into law July 1 by President Nixon.

Sandler noted that its passage barely garnered any notice.

"It would be another three years before the regulation for Title IX would be issued, and yet another year before it would take effect," she wrote. "By then higher education and the country understood that Title IX was going to change the landscape of higher education forever.

"Because of Title IX, the campus has changed irretrievably, and the world of higher education and, indeed, the nation will never again be the same."

* * *

George Mason University has announced the elevation of women's rowing to varsity status and the addition of men's and women's swimming teams this fall as the first step in its four-year plan to bring its athletics program into compliance with Title IX.

Women make up 43 percent of George Mason athletes but 56 percent of the school's undergraduates. Under the new plan, women will make up 54 percent of the school's athletes and receive 55 percent of athletics scholarship aid by the year 2001.

The athletics department plans to accomplish the expansion without cutting any men's sports through an increase in student fees and redistribution of funds within the athletics department budget.

Originally, the athletics department proposed cutting men's volleyball and tennis. However, after members of those teams and of the George Mason student government appeared at a Board of Visitors meeting to address the issue, that plan was revamped.

Kimberly Farfone, president-elect of the university's student government, told The Washington Post that students were adamant that the department not cut men's sports. She said the student government association did not support raising the fees but did not protest it either.

Fees will increase $3.50 per year per student under the plan.

The addition of the three teams resulted from a study conducted by athletics director Thomas J. O'Connor and Maurice Scherrens, university senior vice-president, at the request of George Mason President Alan G. Merten.

"This is a continuation of our goal to provide quality, competitive programs in all intercollegiate sports as well as to provide balance in men's and women's programs within the spirit and intent of Title IX," O'Connor said in a statement.

Neither women's rowing or men's and women's swimming will be fully funded by the university, but all three teams will have some scholarship aid. The athletics department is determining how much aid will be allocated.

Another issue George Mason is considering is the addition of football, for which many alumni and students are pushing. If a football team is added, it could significantly alter the balance of male and female athletes, requiring the university to again find ways to increase opportunities for female athletes. As of now, officials said George Mason has no plans to add football.

--Compiled by Sally Huggins

Title IX Ticker is a monthly feature in The NCAA News. News and information regarding Title IX and gender-equity issues can be sent to The NCAA News, Attn.: Title IX Ticker, 6201 College Boulevard, Overland Park, Kansas 66211-2422.