what did Title IX mean for you?

This week is the 37th anniversary of Title IX, the 1972 federal legislation that required schools to fund athletics equally, for males & females. When it went into affect only 7% of girls participated in sports. These days more than 40% of girls participate.

It affected me. I was a freshman in high school in 1972. Come my sophomore year Mr. Cunningham, the boys’ JV basketball coach, had to create a girls’ tennis team to supplement girls’ sports, which before then included only basketball, volleyball and softball. Me, Mindy, Jane and a few others joined up. We were so new we didn’t even rate a photo in the 1973 yearbook. By 1974-75, when Fridays came along, and with it the mandatory athletes-with-an-event must dress-up-and-wear-a-tie-to-school, I borrowed a tie from Jane’s dad, pre-knotted and we walked down the halls proudly. I wore a green & white ensemble — green pants, white vest, green/white striped shirt (all-girl attire, probably sewn by my mom) — with Mr. Conrad’s green tie. Jane and I formed the Girls Letter Club with the motto: “Bulldogs come in all shapes and sizes.”

We didn’t get too many complaints, at least to our faces. Mindy was the Homecoming princess/queen  who everyone liked (with good reason). Jane was smart and from a big city back in Michigan; her dad was manager of one of the biggest employers around, the Ford proving grounds out at Yucca. Sharon was always game!

Mr. Cunningham, also my algebra teacher (I loved algebra), seemed stiff and confused by coaching girls, but he was professional about it, never mean, just distant and coached us for two years. My senior year Mr. Laulo stepped in and stuck with it, and actually tried to teach us some tennis skills. I stuck with tennis, too, although I was a not a gifted player, and ended up with a big blue varsity “K” on my letterwoman’s sweater-jacket.

Bulldogs come in all shapes and sizes

When I went to college I wore that sweater the first week, and some ladies commented that they wanted me on their team, no matter what (although we didn’t have sports at that school, so it would have been pick up games of some sort or the other). Most of my awards were actually for music. I stopped wearing the sweater, not wanting to get put in a position I couldn’t perform to. At some point it time it disappeared, although I think my mom salvaged the letters and pins. They are somewhere in my attic.

Find out a little history about Title IX here.

How did Title IX affect you? Whether you knew it or not? (Hint: not only sports were affected.)

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