Gender+and+High+School+Sports

**How do Gender and Funding Affect High School Athletic Equality?**

I. Description of Problem or Issue

The problems we are focusing on are the differences in funding between boys' and girls' sports in high school, the unequal distribution of opportunities between girls' and boys' in high school athletics, and the differences in funding between private and public high school sports. Our main research question is how do gender and funding affect high school athletic equality?

II. Research Summary 

Erin's research focused on how Title IX affects high school sports an the gender equity issue of athletics. Title IX states that no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance. The opportunity for girls' is not yet equal to the opportunities available for boys' who play high school sports. Even more, high schools are not required to disclose any of their information regarding athletics to the federal government, so even if certain schools are not following Title IX, it goes unnoticed unless it is brought to the attention of the local or federal government.

Meredith's research was based on finding out what is the difference between girls' and boys' when it came to high school sports. Gender equity may have many meanings. When it comes to high school sports it is an environment in which fair and equitable distribution of overall athletic opportunities, benefits and resources is the same for both boys and girls. It is more based on the quality and not the funding budget. But when it comes to say soccer for example, both the boys and girls teams need to have the same everything. The opportunities, scheduling, travel etc. must be equal between the teams. Also in my research, I found a lot of examples where girls have been treated unfairly, and how women are still not equal to men when it comes to sports.

 Scott's research was mostly on the differences between the funding in private high schools and the funding in public high schools. While the rest of the research focused on the program "Pay-to-Play". From my reseacher I found that private high schools recieve more funding that public high schools because private high schools charge tuition that they can use and distribute to all the different programs. On the other hand, public high schools have a budget that they recieve and most of that goes to supplies for the students and little of it goes to sports funding. Since the sports recieve little funding, many high schools are enforcing the "Pay-to-Play" program to raise money for new equipment, referees and time on the field, court or ice rink. I also found that more schools are using the "Pay-to-Play" program rather than cutting the sports program.

III. Group Product Overview

We found during our research that although girls' athletics have come a long way since Title IX, equality does still not still fully exist between girls' sports and boys' sports. Some of the reasons of why boys seem to get more than girls is because it is based on quality not quantity. Between boys and girls, equality of equipment, coaching, practice times, etc needs to be the same. However, their funding budget does not have to be the same. For example, the boys' football team and the girls' tennis team don't have the same funding budget because they need the money for different things. Yet they should have equal amounts of appropriate equipment, coaching quality, etc. Also, there is a difference between funding in public high schools and private high schools. Private schools recieve more funding for equiment, coach salaries, and for fields and courts. In public high schools, there is less funding and more schools are starting to put "Pay to Play" in affect to gain more funding for the athletes.   IV. Visual Representation 

**V. Research Questions and Reference Summaries **

 *  || **Research Question **<span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;"> || **<span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">Researcher **<span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;"> ||
 * <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">1. || <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">How Does Gender Affect High School Sports Funding? || <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">Meredith ||
 * <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">2. || <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">What Are The Funding Differences Between Public and Private High Schools? || <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">Scott ||
 * <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">3. || <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">How Does Title IX Affect High School Sports? || <span style="font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">Erin ||