'Opportunities For Girls To Play Sports Not Equal To Boys'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Researchers at the University of Michigan compared data from four-year public high schools across the country, including schools that do and do not offer interscholastic sports. They broke the data down by regions, what type of communities the schools were in (rural vs. city, etc), and how much money the schools spent on athletics. Then they compared data from the 2009-10 school year with data from school years 1993-94 and 1999-2000.
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The studies' authors warn that their findings indicate that progress towards gender equity has reversed over the past decade thanks to a false sense that girls were finally receiving an equal chance to play sports and less funding due to the recession. "One sociological tenet contends that, during times of economic hardship, social inequalities tend to grow more marked rather than diminish," the researchers explained. "This dynamic may be playing out with regard to gender equity in high school sports."

So while it's legally possible for girls to hit the gym as much as the boys do, more than 40 years after major legislation changed the sports scene in the United States, there's still not an equal playing field. Studies like this may help fight back against common assertions that Title IX has taken away opportunities from boys by causing schools to drop expensive sports teams in order to make teams for girls. With all the benefits sports provide to both boys and girls, it seems like every public school child should not only get the chance, but be encouraged, to take the field, court or track. By the look of the country's skyrocketing obesity rate, it's certainly better than the alternative.'

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Look at the graph-- a shade in some cases of a difference in numbers of teams and suddenly it's all-hell-breaking-loose-something-must-be-done! Any consideration for this factor: Maybe girls don't like to play sports as much as boys and so because they are less interested, there are fewer girls' teams? Is that possible? Did anyone ask the girls?

Meanwhile, 70% of undergrad degrees are awarded to women and US female athletes at the 2012 Summer Olympics took home more medals than US male athletes, and there's still a barn-on-fire-level emergency in girls' sports-- clearly, Title IX must be aggressively applied to the high schools and only when 90% of the sports teams are girls teams and 90% of the STEM subjects are populated with female students where there FINALLY be justice!!

Oy veh...

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