Case Review

This section focuses on relevant court cases that have had an influential impact on the study of Title IX. We have tried to present a representative selection of cases in the following areas:

I. Out of Court Settlements:
Rachel Sanders et al vs. University of Texas at Austin

II. Women's Suits:
Favia vs. Indiana University of Pennsylvania
Roberts vs. Colorado State University

III. Men's Suits:
Kelley vs. Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
Eight Male Student Athletes vs. State University of New York-Albany

IV. Recent Supreme Court Decision
Amy Cohen, et al. vs. Brown University

V. Other Cases


Rachel Sanders et al vs. University of Texas at Austin

a. Lawsuit:
On July 1, 1992 a class action Title IX lawsuit was filed by seven women athletes on behalf of all female athletes in both varsity and intramural programs. Their lawsuit stated that the University of Texas at Austin, failed to provide adequate participation opportunities as required under Title IX. They wanted an additional four women’s varsity programs: crew, softball, gymnastics, and soccer.

b. School Decision
On July 16, 1993, in an out-of-court settlement, the university agreed to double the number of women participating in varsity sports. This action has increased the number of female athletes from 23% to 44%. The university also decided to increase the number of female athletic scholarships over a five year period from 32% to 42% of the total number of athletic scholarships offered. The school also updated women’s soccer to varsity level status beginning in the fall of 1993 and softball will follow in 1995-96. A comprehensive review of the university’s athletic program will be made during the 1996-97 academic year to determine if another women’s sport needs to be upgraded to varsity status in order to achieve the 44% figure.

c. Court Decision
Because the females involved were not seeking payment for damages, the case was settled out of court.


Favia vs. Indiana University of Pennsylvania

a. Enrollment and Athletes
Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP) in the 1990 - 1991 school year had an undergraduate population of 10,793 students. Of these students there were 4,790 males (44.3%) and 6,003 females (55.6%). The number of athletes on campus was 503, with a total of 18 varsity programs. The breakdown of males and females that participated in a varsity sport was 313 (62.2%) and 190 (37.7%) respectively.

b. School Decision
IUP was forced, because of cutbacks in state and federal aid, to make budget cuts across campus. Their decision was to eliminate women’s varsity gymnastics, women’s varsity field hockey, men’s varsity soccer, and men’s varsity tennis. Due to the elimination of these teams IUP’s athletic program now had 397 athletes. The men made up 63.49% of the athletes (248), and the women 36.51% (149). IUP then continued by decreasing the number of scholarships awarded so that female athletes received only 21% of the total money ($67,423 out of a possible $314,178). In October of 1992 members of the two women’s teams that had been cut brought a legal suit against IUP charging that IUP discriminated against female athletes in its athletic program, thus violating Title IX. The suit sought to have the two women's programs reinstated and to make sure that no other female sports at IUP were eliminated.

c. Decision of the District Court
The District Court decided that IUP was not in compliance with Title IX. The court found that IUP did not fulfill the proportionality prong of the three prong test because the cuts resulted in a further decrease in the amount of female athletes at IUP. The second prong was not found to be in compliance either because IUP had not showed a continual practice of "expanding athletic opportunities." IUP also failed the third prong by not being able to show that female athletes had their interests and abilities accommodated. Since IUP failed each prong of the test the district court agreed with the plaintiffs and demanded that women’s gymnastics and
women’s field hockey be reinstated.


Roberts vs. Colorado State University

a. Enrollment and Athletes
During the 1991 - 1992 school year Colorado State University (CSU) had an athletic program that consisted of 17 varsity teams for both male and female athletes. In this year women made up 47.9% of the total
undergraduate population, but accounted for only 35.2% of the athletes.

b. School Decision
Over the summer of 1992 CSU experienced monetary problems as the amount of its state aid was reduced. In response the university decided to eliminate women’s varsity softball and men’s varsity baseball. After this decision the number of female athletes rose to 37.7% but the number of female undergraduates also rose to 48.2%. In response to this decision the players on the women’s softball filed a suit against CSU declaring that they were being denied an equal opportunity to play athletics at the intercollegiate level. They asked that their team be reinstated and that they be given additional monetary relief.

c. Decision of District Court
CSU argued that the 10.6% disparity between the number of female undergraduates and the number of female athletes was relatively proportionate. The district court did not agree with them and therefore ruled that CSU failed the first prong of the test because the 10.6% was too great a disparity. The court further stated that CSU was not in compliance with the second prong because they had not increased the number of women’s teams in 12 years. Having an equal number of teams for each gender does not necessarily fulfill this requirement. In addition to this, CSU had not taken any action on the 1983 Title IX compliance review given to their athletic department by OCR which stated that women’s facilities and treatment were not equitable. The district court also found that there was a significant interest by the female undergraduates at CSU to require the school to support the women’s softball team. Therefore, CSU was ordered to reinstate the women’s softball team.

As these last two cases illustrate compliance with Title IX does not mandate that a school create women’s teams if there is no interest or expectation shown. However, these two cases do show that if there is any interest or expectation in a sport then the school must provide these athletes with the opportunity to participate. This same standard may not hold for male athletes who have lost their athletic program. It is interesting to note that the last two cases were both situations in which the institution cut equal numbers of male and female sports. In both instances, however, the court decided that the school could not cut the female teams because it would have the schools further out of compliance.


Kelley vs. Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

a. Enrollment and Athletes
The University of Illinois in 1992 - 1993 had a total undergraduate body of 25,846 students. There were 14,427 males (56%) and 11,419 females (44%). Of the 474 athletes at Illinois 363 of them were male (76.6%) and 111 were female (23.4%). Illinois had seven varsity sports.

b. School Decision
Due to budgetary constraints on May 7, 1993 Illinois was forced to eliminate its men’s varsity swimming, men’s varsity diving, men’s varsity fencing, and women’s varsity diving. Four months later the men’s swim team filed a suit against Illinois. The members of the swim team argued that they were being discriminated against, in violation of Title IX, because Illinois abolished only their team and not the women’s swim team. They also alleged that Illinois violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

c. Decision of District Court
The ruling of the district court was that Illinois had not violated Title IX. The court offered two reasons for its decision. First, Title IX allows the elimination of an athletic program if the underrepresented gender is not affected. Second, Title IX allows for the elimination of one gender’s program or team while keeping the other gender's team as long as the program being cut is the over represented gender. Therefore, the district court concluded that the women’s athletic teams at Illinois should not be cut as long as they continued to be the underrepresented gender.


Eight Male Student Athletes vs. State University of New York-Albany

a. Athletics at Suny-AU
In 1993, the percentage of student athletes at the University of Albany was an overwhelming 65% male and 35% female. Since that time, however, the school has been able to increase the percentage of female athletes to within 1% or 2% of the total proportion of women in the student body, bringing the percentage of athletic participation up to 47%.

b. School Decision
On June 3, 1993, the University of Albany announced program cuts for the fall of 1994 in an effort to maintain not only gender equity but also fiscal responsibility. The proposed cuts would eliminate the following programs: men’s and women’s swimming, wrestling, men’s tennis, and junior varsity programs in football and basketball. As a result of the cuts, eight men’s sports would remain and 11 women’s sports would also remain. The lawsuit that was brought against the university sought to reinstate the four varsity sports. The university did add women’s golf and field hockey for the 1994-95 season.

c. Decision of the District Court
In 1995, a state judge ruled in favor of the University. In the appeal, the court stated that the President of the university had the right to eliminate the teams. Since this ruling in 1995, another suit was filed in May of 1996 by 7 more students. In the new legal suit, 7 male students claim that the cuts violated Title IX by discriminating against men. The State Appeals court has upheld the previous decision to eliminate sports. This decision shows that it is easier for a school to reach Title IX compliance by eliminating a male sport.


Amy Cohen, et al. vs. Brown University (http://www.netspace.org/herald/library/titleix)

The most recent and relevant court case concerning Title IX is Amy Cohen, et al. vs. Brown University et al. There is a general consensus among those involved with Title IX that this is a landmark case that has the potential to have a great impact on colleges across the United States.

a. Enrollment and Athletes
When the case against Brown University was filed in 1992, females consisted of 51% of the undergraduate student population. The percentage of athletes that were female was only 38%, creating a 13 percentage point disparity. Participation figures for the 1995-1996 season shows that 48% of the athletes are now female and that 52% of the undergraduates are female also. These numbers have changed although Brown has maintained the same number of varsity female sports (17). The main reason for these shifts is that male programs were cut.

b. School Decision
The decision of the school during the summer of 1991 was to eliminate four teams. The reasoning behind this cut had to do with the fact that Brown had a $1.6 million budget deficit. The teams that were to be eliminated were women's gymnastics, women's volleyball, men's golf, and men's water polo. All of these were varsity sports. The cuts affected 37 male and 23 female athletes. In response nine members of the women's gymnastics team filed a suit against Brown University for violation of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.

c. Decision of the District Court
In April of 1992 the members of Brown's women’s gymnastics and volleyball teams filed their suit against Brown. Shortly after the legal documents were issued, the women's teams were ordered to be reinstated (to varsity status).

Brown University decided to fight the case, and in September of 1994, two and a half years after the suit was filed, the Federal District Court began to hear the case. In March 1995 the court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs stating that Brown University was in violation of the Title IX policy. Brown decided to appeal the decision to the Federal Appeals Court in Boston, MA. Their appeal was rejected by a 2-1 vote in mid-November, 1996.

Three months later Brown petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case arguing that the issues presented here have wide-ranging impact on countless colleges across America. On April 21, 1997, more than five years after the case began, the Supreme Court decided not to hear the case, letting the lower court ruling stand. The jury is still out on the actual consequences or benefits of the decision. Some people feel that the Supreme Court copped out by not hearing this case.

This was an opportunity for the Supreme Court to set a precedent to be followed for many years. Many people agree that this decision will force more schools to strive for compliance. This was a large loss for schools because the court showed that it will not allow any leeway in terms of compliance. If schools do not establish themselves as compliant under the three-prong test of Title IX, then there may be a great increase in the number of court cases to follow.


Other Cases

There are two other forms of Title IX cases that should be noted: equal pay lawsuits and wrongful termination or retaliation lawsuits. Equal pay lawsuits are those in which a person feels that they are not being paid the proper amount for the duties they perform. This type of lawsuit is most commonly filed by female coaches because they feel that their salary is not comparable to that of the male coaches in the same sport at their school. Listed below are three cases that have been filed and could be classified under this category:

• Sanya Tyler vs. Howard
• Ann A. Pitts vs. Oklahoma State University
• Marianne Stanley vs. University of Southern California

Wrongful termination or retaliation cases are often brought about by a coach who feels that he or she had been fired because of some form of discrimination. Each case is different and unique in its own way making it difficult to generalize these cases any further. Three examples of this type of case are:

• Stephanie Schleuder vs. University of Minnesota
• Bob Reinhart vs. Georgia State University
• Pam Bowers vs. Baylor University

Further information on Supreme Court Cases, especially ones after our release in May of 1998, please use this link to the University of Iowa’s (http://www.uiowa.edu) page on Gender Equity (http://www.arcade.uiowa.edu/proj/ge). It includes the best section (that we have found) on court cases, entitled Index to Updates & Lawsuits by Category (http://www.arcade.uiowa.edu/proj/ge/category.html).