The new issue of the Wisconsin Women's Law Journal contains two student-written pieces that address different aspects of Title IX.
The first, by Madeline E. McNeeley, argues that educational institutions should do more to protect pregnant and parenting girls from discrimination, as the law requires. Among other forms of discrimination that McNeeley describes, she points out how the No Child Left Behind Act creates incentives for schools to fail or expel pregnant and parenting students (often citing attendance problems) by tying federal funding to students' academic performance. Schools are often willing to work with disabled or ailing students by providing homebound instruction and other assistance, but they would rather not encourage pregnant/parenting students to stay in school and give them the help they need to lift up their grades and test scores because there is too much to loose if they should fail.
The second, by Elizabeth S. Kisthardt, examines the Department of Education's new regulations allowing schools to experiment with single-sex education. Kitshardt encourages educators and school districts to "remain cautious" about implementing single-sex classrooms, owing to the mixed research results "regarding both the existence of the 'boy crisis' and the remedial benefits of single-sex settings." (Her advice comes too late for Greene County.) She argues that "to the extent the research has produced conflicting results, it remains questionable whether the current educational and psychological evidence should be used to justify segregation by sex."
Citations:
Madeline E. McNeeley, Title IX and Equal Educational Access for Pregnant and Parenting Girls, 22 Wisc. Women's L.J. 267 (2007);
Elizabeth S. Kisthardt, Singling Them Out: The Influence of the "Boy Crisis" on Title IX Regulations, 22 Wisc. Women's L.J. 313 (2007).
