This is your President

At the same time, though, we are seeing applications of various civil rights laws causing harm to others.

While not applicable in single-sex classrooms, I know of other problems with Title IX that have occurred. Many colleges are dropping aports programs because of the way the law is being interpreted and applied.

See: http://www.nationalreview.com/lopez/lopez052302.asp

I think some flexibility and latitude for local schools in some areas is needed. I did not hear Kimball_Kinnison say "get rid of Title IX", or "gut civil rights laws" in his posts.

Quite frankly, I think a local system has more of a clue what might work best and give students the best chance than some DC bureaucrat. Potential inequality is not enough of a reason for me. Last time I checked, we operated under the principle of innocent until proven guilty, not the other way around.

EDIT:

Any Amendment that weakens the stregnth of civil rights laws is inherently wrong. Surely you must recognize this.

So is implemenation of those same civil rights in a manner to create quotas of any sort. As is the poor implementation of civil rights law.

 

While not applicable in single-sex classrooms, I know of other problems with Title IX that have occurred. Many colleges are dropping aports programs because of the way the law is being interpreted and applied.

The article you have link to is not only heavily biased, but ignores two direct quotes from the school, here: In a statement to the press, Howard's athletic director, Sondra Norrell-Thomas, said the decision was "very difficult, but necessary," claiming: "At this time, we lack the facilities to support baseball and wrestling." and here: Lawanza Spears, a spokeswoman for Howard University told NRO Wednesday night, "The decision was based solely on the lack of facilities needed to support the baseball and wrestling programs."

Despite these quotes, the article goes on to outline the quota-conspiracy... they don't even identify it as "alleged". I believe that's called Yellow Journalsim.

I did not hear Kimball_Kinnison say "get rid of Title IX", or "gut civil rights laws" in his posts.

You are absolutely right. He did not say that, nor did I claim he did. Please do not put words in my cyber-mouth.

I think some flexibility and latitude for local schools in some areas is needed.

It stands to reason, given a knowledge of history and human/government behavior, that ammending laws will lead to abuse that cannot be reined in legally. The flexibility and latitude they speak of is not about whther or not to reform the AP English class. It is regarding what criteria must be met to justify "equality" between classroom/school programs. That is not something that should be flexible.

So is implemenation of those same civil rights in a manner to create quotas of any sort. As is the poor implementation of civil rights law.

I agree, quotas are an unneeded biproduct of Title IX; however, Nowhere in Title IX does it force quotas, suggest quotas, or otherwise rally behind the concept of quotas. That is not what is written, and that is not how it was interpretted. I think quotas benefit neither the institution nor the individual. Let's not confuse Quotas with Title IX. The former began as an ill-concieved solution to implement the latter.

 

Snowdog: That is why I consider the single-sex classroom a red herring. It draws attention away from hundreds of more critical weak links in our educational system... which can actually improve performance if fixed, as opposed to creating a solution that has potentially devastating social consequences, both short term and long term.

Cheveyo: The small clarification you speak of are actually amendments to the regulations--or rule changes, as the original CNN article describes--implemmenting Title IX, which is the 1972 civil rights statute designed to ensure equality for the genders in public schools.

Snowdog, I would say that it is not Bush turning this into a big issue, but his opposition. Bush has endorsed a wide range of plans (like those I mentioned earlier, would you like me to post more?), but for some reason a lot of people seem to ignore those and focus only on the single-sex education issue, which is, in fact, a non-issue.

Cheveyo and Snowdog: All that the small clarification that I mentioned does is codify some of the interpretations of Title IX made by the courts into law. This does provide additional flexibility because it makes it harder for school systems to be sued for things that were already legal. It is a common practice to make these clarifications to law after a large number of court cases have upheld an interpretation. Same-sex public schools were legal before Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act, and that Act confirms that they are still legal.

Snowdog: I'm not talking about civil rights... I'm talking about government endorsement of criminal behavior. If an organization engages in hateful behavior that borders on harassment or something else criminal, the decision against them isn't because of their beliefs as an organization so much as it is against their act of trampling the rights of other individuals or groups. Typically, organizations such as the KKK and Neo-Nazis are rallied solely for the purpose of abridging other groups civil rights and freedoms.

It is not government endorsement of criminal behavior. I specifically stated that they have to obey the same laws as everyone else. As an example, in April 1977, a group of Neo-Nazis wanted to hold a march through the town of Skokie, IL (which was about 60% Jewish). After they were denied a permit to hold a peaceful assembly, they fought the case into the Illinois Supreme Court. There it was determined that as long as they obeyed the law they could not be discriminated against. (As a side note, they were restricted from using the swastika during their march.)

If they had decided to march through the town in military uniforms and carrying guns, they would have been denied completely (as would almost anyone else except the US military). However, because they met the same standards as anyone else, they could not be denied equal protection under the law because of their political beliefs, however objectionable they might me.

Cheveyo: I agree, quotas are an unneeded biproduct of Title IX; however, Nowhere in Title IX does it force quotas, suggest quotas, or otherwise rally behind the concept of quotas. That is not what is written, and that is not how it was interpretted. I think quotas benefit neither the institution nor the individual. Let's not confuse Quotas with Title IX. The former began as an ill-concieved solution to implement the latter.

Unfortunately, Title IX has been interpreted to set quotas based on gender. For example, one of the most common interpretations (to which JediSmuggler referred) is for sports, stating that while you do not have to make the same sports available to both genders, you have to spend the same amount of money on sports for each. This is a problem form many schools where they use their footbal program (which gets quite expensive) as a source of revenue and then have to spend an equal amount on other sports that don't bring in very much (if any) money for the school.

Sorry I'm not going to be around too much. We have a big proje