Men get rehired, women get rejected
There’s a double standard in college sports that treats coaches differently depending on whether they discriminated under Title IX or were the ones discriminated against — men get rehired, and women get rejected for other top coaching jobs. But the latest example of that suggests that there may be a crack or even a tectonic shift in that double standard, perhaps due to Title IX activism of the past decade that fed into the #metoo movement.
In the past week, Grambling (La.) State University hired Art Briles, the disgraced former football coach for Baylor University, to be offensive coordinator. Baylor fired him for mishandling complaints of rape in a huge scandal that eventually implicated 19 football players, other departments, and university leadership. Briles coached at a Texas high school before joining Grambling. Here’s the twist — he resigned from the Grambling post four days after the announcement as resistance emerged from state officials and the public. So, maybe that first part of the double standard is starting to crack — the part about perpetrators of discrimination being rehired on the presumption that they deserve another chance.
You know who doesn’t get a second chance? The women who get discriminated against. In the 2018 video interview posted above, former athletics administrator Diane Milutinovich notes that women coaches who sue for discrimination don’t get rehired as head coaches of college teams again. She and Stacey Johnson-Klein and Lindy Vivas each won multi-million dollars in legal judgements or settlements from California State University, Fresno, but it ended their careers. Johnson-Klein then coached an Oklahoma high school team for a time.
Milutinovich cited three other examples of top coaches in their sports who won discrimination cases and lost top jobs: Former San Diego State University women’s basketball coach Beth Burns took a lesser coaching position at the University of Southern California and now is an associate strength and conditioning coach at the University of Louisville, Ky. Former University of Iowa field hockey coach Tracey Griesbaum is a volunteer at Duke University. And former University of Minnesota-Duluth women’s hockey coach Shannon Miller went to Canada to coach professional women’s teams.
The second half of the double standard seems very much alive.
Elsewhere
South Carolina State University fired its women’s basketball coach a day after she filed a Title IX complaint saying the school discriminates against the women’s program. The president of Hennepin Technical College, Brooklyn Park, Minn. remained on the job after an investigation determined that his derisive statements created a disrespectful workplace yet didn’t reach the threshold of harassment. But then he resigned the presidency, and will be transferred to an administrative post in the State system. Kalamazoo, Mich. prosecutors charged a captain of Western Michigan University‘s hockey team with raping another student.
A staff member at Teutopolis schools, Effingham, Ill. is demanding that the system stop discriminating by giving junior and senior high boys’ baseball teams awesome fields while requiring the girls’ softball teams to play on “crap” fields. A quarter of New Hanover County, N.C. middle and high school students report that they’ve experienced sexual harassment.
On the up side
You could win 1 of 20 copies of 37 Words being given away on GoodReads.com if you enter by March 15! Enter here.
An update from the Office for Civil Rights suggests they will release new draft federal rules for Title IX in April, a month earlier than expected. Activism by students at Blake High School, Tampa, Fla. produced action by administrators. The University of Massachusetts, Amherst adopted a sexual assault Survivors’ Bill of Rights. Administrators at Grand Canyon University, Phoenix, Ariz., explained that the school could have football or other men’s sports, but not both — which is progress compared with historical trends of schools pouring money into football and other men’s sports while short-changing women. Transgender lawyers are among those fighting repressive state legislation that aims to bar transgender athletes from school sports.
Where you’ll find me
March 2022 — The New York Historical Society’s Center for Women’s History & Academic Affairs will stream a prerecorded discussion with me and some of the earliest Title IX activists. I’ll speak with National Women’s Law Center founder Marcia Greenberger, Project on Equal Education Rights founder Holly Knox, and Margaret Dunkle, the original chair of the National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education. Part of the Max Conference on Women’s History, the discussion streams online during Women’s History Month.
March 24, 6:30 p.m. PT — A virtual get-together with the Riverside, Calif. chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW).
On April 2, 1:30-3:00 p.m ET — I’ll be in Boston speaking on a panel at the Organization of American Historians annual conference.
April 12 — Book launch day! From 12 noon to 1 p.m. PT at San Francisco State University, the school’s chapter of NLGJA: The Association of LGBTQ Journalists hosts a live gathering of students and a give-away of books by three authors (including moi) who will join via Zoom. I’ll be there virtually with Vanessa Hua and Lucy Jane Bledsoe. Later, join me at 7 p.m. ET for a hybrid 37 Words book launch event live at Norwich Bookstore in Vermont and virtually. Details to come!
April 13, 2:00-3:00 p.m. ET — You’re invited to a lively Zoom discussion between me and Kenyora Parham, executive director of End Rape on Campus, as we talk about 37 Words during Sexual Assault Awareness Month. I’ll post links when available.
April 21, 7 p.m. ET — A virtual get-together with the Washington, D.C. chapter of NOW.
June 23, 3:00-4:30 p.m. ET — Title IX’s 50th birthday! I’ll Zoom with members of the Association of Title IX Administrators (ATIXA) to celebrate.
Here’s where you’ll find links to preorder my book 37 Words: Title IX and Fifty Years of Fighting Sex Discrimination. Preorders are so helpful! Thanks for your support.
