Re: Single-Sex , Title IX, and the OCR
Linda Purrington (lpurring@earthlink.net)
Fri, 03 Apr 1998 17:33:13 -0800
The Office for Civil Rights has been stunningly uninterested in
enforcing Title IX in general. Far from speeding enforcement efforts,
it has since Franklin v. Gwinnett County in 1992 largely been concerned
with constricting access to equal rights for girls, rather than
encouraging it.
Its defunding of Title IX efforts in the states by dismantling Title IV
is one example; its refusal to issue letters of finding after
investigations is another; its refusal to take on an investigation
unless all o;ther attempts to find redress have stopped is yet another;
and its refusal to consider most cases at all is the worst. It isnot
even surprising that the OCR is not interested in charging single sex
schools with violating girls' civil rights; across the country, the
battle against racial segregation of schools is also falling by the
wayside.
These battles will not be won by going through the OCR, but by going
AROUND it. Most specifically, we need grassroots activists, people who
organize to get information about Title IX out and who are willing to
use the courts' decision that Title IX now has its best chance, not in
an OCR investigation, but in a civil lawsuit with damages.
For the first time, Franklin v. Gwinnett County gave private citizens a
way to demand enforcment of the law; and it should be used.
We can all get the regulation, read the case law, and start educating
our communities. Out of those communities will come the girls and their
families who say, Hey, I didn't know I had those rights! I want them
now!
Linda Purrington
Title IX Advocates <lpurring@earthlink.net>
tina wrote:
>
> I am sorry to be coming on what seems the tail-end of this flurry of
> information regarding the single-sex public school issue. I wanted you to
> know, especially Linda Purrington, that the New York City Chapter of the
> National Organization for Women and the New York Civil Liberties Union have
> been actively involved with trying to get the office of civil rights to
> enforce Title IX in the case of the Harlem Leadership School for Girls. They
> have met with Norma Cantu on several occasions--to no avail. NOW-NYC's
> former president, Anne Conners, and Michael Meyers of NYCLU--are, to my
> knowledge, the only two people speaking out on this issue (besides
> yourselves ofcourse)--and NOW-NYC has taken a lot of blows from their stand.
> NOW's position is basically: 'we get thousands of calls from women suffering
> from sexual harrassment in the workplace--we don't tell them 'the only thing
> we can do is create separate-sex work environments..why should we run away
> from, and sex-segregate, these problems when they concern teenage girls.."
> Also, the NAACP has also taken a stand against these public single sex
> schools...
>
> Just so you know--the Office of Civil Rights has been stunningly
> disinterested in enforcing Title IX in these cases.
>
> <tina@tiac.net>