Title IX at 50: A Brief History
Prior to the enactment of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, there was a significant disparity between men and women[1] in education throughout the United States. Laws in the early 1900s mandating children attend school from kindergarten through 12th grade ensured girls’ presence in K-12 schools. However, classes and extracurricular offerings were not equal for boys and girls.
The problem of inequitable access persisted at postsecondary institutions. Again, classes, sports, and extracurricular activities were not equally accessible to college women. This problem was compounded by the reality that societal pressures, norms, and admissions policies resulted in far fewer women attending undergraduate and graduate institutions compared to men. The inability for women to access these predominantly male spaces set the stage for what would become the most powerful legal tool to address sex discrimination and sexual harassment in education.[2]
Title IX states, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”
Representative Patsy T. Mink (whom Title IX was renamed after posthumously in 2002 in honor of her contributions) was the author and sponsor of Title IX, and introduced the legislation in Congress. Senator Birch Bayh also fought for the statute’s passing in the Senate, stressing the importance of rejecting societal norms regarding how women were treated. The statute opened doors for women and girls in sports, coursework, careers, and access to colleges and graduate programs that did not previously exist. While attempts to limit the scope of Title IX were numerous after its passage, the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987 ensured that the law applied to an entire institution if any of its programs or activities received Federal funding.
While Title IX is perhaps more readily associated with women’s and girls’ sports programs, the law goes much deeper than that. In 1992, the Supreme Court ruled in Franklin v. Gwinnett County Public Schools that Title IX gave individuals a private right of action to redress violations of the statute and validated sexual harassment as a facet of sex discrimination protected by Title IX. This allowed students to seek redress from schools in instances of sexual misconduct that denied them equal access to educational spaces. In 2020, the Court in Bostock v. Clayton County held that discrimination based on one’s sexual orientation or gender identity constituted sex discrimination. While Bostock applied to Title VII, courts have already begun applying the ruling to Title IX, which is often viewed as a sister statute to Title VII. In Grimm v. Gloucester County School Board, the 4th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals prohibited schools from denying transgender students access to bathrooms that align with their gender identity.
At Van Dermyden Makus, attorneys serve as Hearing Officers in schools’ Title IX resolution processes at both the K-12 and higher education levels. Attorneys also provide assistance in drafting and amending schools’ policies relating to Title IX to ensure compliance with the constantly evolving federal regulations. Title IX is a tool to make sure that every student, regardless of how they identify, is provided with equal access to education. It is our job to make sure that the procedures used to implement the statute are done so in a fair and equitable manner for all students.
Lexi Weyrick is an Associate Attorney with Van Dermyden Makus. In October 2020, she spoke on a panel for a national Title IX Symposium regarding the litigation challenges to the 2020 Title IX Rule.
[1] While sex and gender does not exist on a binary, the discussion surrounding sex discrimination at the time Title IX was enacted was limited in this way.
[2] Paraphrasing a statement made by Suzanne Goldberg, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Strategic Operations and Outreach for the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, in the Keynote Address at the University of Virginia’s School of Law Symposium, “50 Years of Title IX: Toward a Title IX for All.”