On Oct. 19, student-athletes at Lakeland will be joining together to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Title IX. Lakeland’s softball team, the host of this event, will grill hot dogs, brats, and burgers for everyone who wants to come out and celebrate. This includes students who are not involved in athletics. This event is open to all Lakeland students and is a great opportunity to celebrate all the great things Title IX has done for each individual student.

Enacted into law in June 1972, Title IX was created to prohibit federally funded schools from discriminating against students and faculty based on sex. The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) was created in 1906 to format and enforce rules in men’s football. It offered no athletic scholarships for women and held no championships for women’s teams. Many facilities, supplies, and funding were lacking for women’s sports.

In 1972, there were only 30,000 women who participated in NCAA sports, as opposed to 170,000 men. Title IX was created to make these numbers more balanced so that equal opportunity was available to both men and women. After the Title IX law was passed, the number of 30,000 grew to over 150,000 women participating in collegiate athletics.

“Some key issue areas in which recipients have Title IX obligations are: recruitment, admissions, and counseling; financial assistance; athletics; sex-based harassment, which encompasses sexual assault and other forms of sexual violence; treatment of pregnant and parenting students; treatment of LGBTQI+ students; discipline; single-sex education; and employment.”

Source: https://www.history.com/.amp/this-day-in-history/title-ix-enacted

https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/tix_dis.html