Jamie Reidy calls bullsh** on Title IX.
I wasn’t looking for the emotional combo platter when I sat down to read this Sumathi Reddy essay about problems New York City high schools are having in funding boys’ sport teams. Anger, depression, and helplessness are not the way I normally kick off my weekend.
The Public Schools Athletic League approved 100 new girls’ sports teams citywide for the current school year…But few, if any, new boys sports teams got off the ground. The reason? According to Marge Feinberg, a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Education, a continuing federal probe into its high-school sports programs has left the PSAL focusing on adding girls teams.
The federal government did the right thing when it enacted Title IX in 1972. Female athletes in high school and college simply did not have equal access to participation and facilities as did their male peers. And that was some bigtime bullshit.
Fortunately, Title IX succeeded wildly in its main intention: enabling women’s sports to prosper.
But forty years later, men’s sports are footing the bill for that prosperity. (See: earlier “bullshit” comment)
These teenage athletes in New York don’t care about budget shortfalls and recessionary challenges. These kids care about trying out for shortstop and challenging the senior starter at point guard for playing time.
I love how Ms. Reddy ended her essay:
The school system should be grooming the next Jennifer AND Jeremy Lins, not choosing one over the other.
We need to find a solution. GMP readers, who’s got next?