Linda Purrington wrote:
>
> 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>