“Title IX and the Drive for Gender Equality in Sports,” ABA Minority Trial Lawyer
“Not so long ago, athletic fields in the United States exhibited a clear gender divide,” writes Molly M. Ryan of Goldberg Segalla’s Sports and Entertainment Practice Group. “Today, 40 years after the passage of Title IX — 40 years into a concerted national effort to make the athletic opportunities provided to both sexes more equivalent — some of the legal arguments have circled around with pointed irony to the old traditional categories of football and cheerleading.”
In this article written for Minority Trial Lawyer, a publication of the American Bar Association’s Section of Litigation, Molly examines judicial interpretations of the meaning and implication of this civil rights statute, how a number of court cases have helped make progress in participation rates by females in organized athletic competition, and what challenges remain to be addressed.