On the Cusp of Title IX: Resistance to Inequality and the Leadership of Female Teachers

• In Event: Sociology of Sex and Gender Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 14. Law, Activism, and Institutional Politics

Abstract

This paper examines the case history of a public school in California where teachers resisted and subverted inequality in sports before Title IX was passed in 1972. From the vantage point of 2026, given the expansive interpretation and use of Title IX in promoting gender equity in education, it is important to scrutinize the immediately preceding moment of its passage when high schools did not sponsor interscholastic sports teams for girls or support their physical development and competition. Title IX was able to transform secondary education, not simply because it became the policy of the US, but because before it was passed, female faculty especially established the working grounds for its implementation. They created space for girls’ athleticism, demanded facilities and equipment that would give girls a chance to learn, and did so fiercely and persistently.

Author

• Karen V. Hansen