No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.

Colleges are required to treat male and female students equally when it comes to opportunities to participate in sports, athletic aid (scholarships), and the benefits and services the school provides to athletes.

Opportunity: Colleges are supposed to offer women opportunities to play sports (roster spots) proportional to their percentage of all undergrads. For example, if 50% of undergrads are women, 50% of roster spots should go to women athletes. See how any college is doing on our Gender Equity Dashboard and also see FAQ #3 below.

Athletic aid: Colleges are supposed to provide proportional athletic aid (scholarships) to men and women. For example, if 50% of a college’s athletes are women, 50% of athletic aid should go to women athletes. You can check out any college on our Gender Equity Dashboard. 

Benefits and services: Colleges are supposed to provide a similar quality of benefits and services to men and women athletes across many areas including scheduling, travel, coaching, facilities, dining, publicity, recruitment, and more. (This area is often referred to as “treatment.”)  It is fine for schools to spend more on some teams and less on others, as long as the quality provided is similar.

Not necessarily. Title IX allows schools to comply with the participation requirement in one of three ways:

1. A school can offer spots on teams that are proportional to the percentage of enrolled students of each gender.

For example, if enrollment at a school is 50% women, the school should provide 50% of spots on teams to women athletes. If the number of missing spots on teams is large enough that a new team could be created, then the school is not in compliance with this part of Title IX.

1. Schools can show a continuing record of improvement in providing opportunities for women to participate in athletics.

However, if a school had continually made improvement over 51 years, it should have achieved equity by now.

iii. A school can demonstrate that there is insufficient interest or ability on the part of women athletes to form a new team.

This was included due to fears that not enough women would be interested in playing sports. Schools can show that they are meeting this test through lack of interest in club and intramural teams, lack of requests for varsity teams, or the lack of teams at other schools to compete against. 

Over 3 million girls play varsity sports in high school. We believe that in most cases, there is sufficient interest and ability for schools to achieve a fair share of spots on teams for women athletes.

More from the Department of Education

Colleges and universities are required to report annually to the Equity in Athletics Data Analysis (EADA) survey, which is managed by the U.S. Department of Education. We use data from the EADA website, which is available to the public. Accelerate Equity makes no representation regarding the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of the data posted on the Department of Education’s EADA website.

Not necessarily – and we strongly discourage this approach. Research has shown that when men’s teams are cut, the funds are most often diverted to support men’s basketball and football, rather than to support women’s sports. Also, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, of 948 colleges that added women’s teams, 72% of them did so without cutting men’s teams.

Yes! A school can more actively look for sponsorship deals for all of its teams as a way to increase revenue. By promoting a winning team, media deals and ticket sales can become sources of revenue. Also, expanding women’s sports provides new opportunities to engage alumni donors, especially alums who played sports. If you are a school administrator who wants help increasing revenue, please contact us.

People do! Athletes, parents, alumni, coaches, and others who point out inequities and fight for them to be made right are the main reason that so much progress has been made. The Office of Civil Rights, in the Department of Education, has the responsibility to enforce Title IX and the authority to withhold federal funding from a school that has violated Title IX. In the 51 years since Title IX passed, it has never once used its power to withhold federal funds. Accelerate Equity is creating data transparency to inform not just athletes and educators, but everyone, so that more people can help to advocate for equity.

Yes it does. We are focusing on collegiate sports first because there is more data on colleges. Our plan is to create momentum that we can then use to create change for girls in high school.