Women's Hoops Blog

Inane commentary on a game that deserves far better


Wednesday, September 16, 2009

When the NCAA football guys made "proportionality" as one of the three prongs with which to measure Title IX compliance, they did so primarily because men were the overwhelming majority at universities and they thought it would stay that way.

Well, as many now realize, the joke's on them.
Title IX forced open doors and removed barriers – both legal and social. Girls and women’s participation in both athletics and academics skyrocketed. As Dr. Mary Curtis and Dr. Christine H.B. Grant explain on their “About Title IX” website,“ before Title IX, many schools refused to admit women or enforced strict limits.” Now, noted a July, 2006 New York Times article, “women make up 58% of those enrolled in two-and four-year colleges and are, over all, the majority in graduate schools and professional schools, too.”

That balance has slowly tipped and, it would seem, will continue to tip:

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports today that “the student body on American college campuses will continue to become more racially diverse, older, and more female over the next decade, according to new projections from the U.S. Department of Education.” The article is based on an the latest release of an annual report by the National Center for Education Statistics.

Citing the report, The Chronicle writes that overall enrollment in degree-granting institutions will grow by 13 percent, to 20.6 million, by the fall of 2018, when compared with 2007.