Fully 40 years after the passage of Title IX of our nation’s Civil Rights Act, female athletes have come into their own. The chalk dust is still settling from this year’s Olympic Games, and the ink is still drying on astounding new Olympic and world records. But before the Games fade into history, let the record show that among world-class athletes, this was the Year of the Woman.

Although much remains to be done to advance women in Olympic competition, the International Olympic Committee showed what could happen if change becomes not an evolutionary but an intentional part of the larger work of advancing excellence in sports. For the first time, every nation participating in the Games had a woman on its team, even the previously unthinkable: a woman in the judo competition representing Saudi Arabia.

U.S. commentators observed that, had they been counted as a separate country, the American women who won medals would have ranked third in total medal count among nations. Women represented the majority on Team USA for the first time. Of our nation’s 46 gold medals, 63 percent were won by women – another first. Their performances captivated Americans and captured the hearts of millions of teen girls; viewership of the Olympics by teenage American girls was up a whopping 54 percent. It is no wonder, given the performances by the likes of Claressa Shields, Gabby Douglas, Aly Raisman, Missy Franklin, Carmelita Jeter and three-time gold medalists Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh.

They gave us medals, and they gave us role models.

Word spread during the Olympics that “strong is the new pretty.” We can only hope this new adage will stick – and become at least a partial antidote to the manufactured images of women and girls served up by the popular media as the feminine ideal.

But we can’t rest here. Women were still objectified during this year’s games. After a year of strong performances culminated in a fourth-place finish in London, Lolo Jones grieved over being verbally shredded about her appearance. And for Douglas, the strong young gymnast whose skills matched her shining smile, her history-making gold medal performances shared headlines with unnecessary judgments about her hair.

Instead of irrelevant criticism, let’s focus on performance.

Let’s also focus on encouraging and enabling all women and girls to participate in sports; there is still much work to be done. Women and girls still face major barriers to access, including lack of opportunities and conflicting messages in society about whether they should participate, what they should look like, who they should “be.”

By age 14, girls drop out of sports at twice the rate of boys. Lack of access to sport is a drop-out driver because, in spite of Title IX, which bans sex discrimination in academics and sports, there are still 1.3 million fewer opportunities for girls to participate in high school sports (60,000 fewer in college). Girls often struggle to find a spot on a team, especially in underserved communities where cultural and economic barriers make female participation in sports even more challenging.

Complicating all this are the persistent messages girls receive on the importance of being “Hollywood thin” rather than emulating strong, athletic role models like the ones who medaled in London – or like Geena Davis, the Hollywood star who was an Olympic archery candidate.

Why does it matter? Why do female athletes excelling in Olympic competition make a difference for young women and girls? In the United States it is estimated that 80 percent of our female executives participated actively in sports earlier in their lives. Sports, at its best, is a metaphor for life and a teaching ground for teamwork, leadership, coping with winning and losing, and pursuing one’s personal best.

For women, it is about this and more: a way for women to develop their strength and their power, both literally and figuratively. In this 40th anniversary year of Title IX, let us remember those leaders who fought to pass that legislation, let institutions take seriously the letter of the law, and let us translate its values into women’s sports as an example to the world.

World champion boxer Laila A. Ali is president and Kathryn E. Olson is CEO of the Women’s Sports Foundation.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/openforum/article/Strong-is-pretty-and-Olympics-are-proof-3794627.php#ixzz25xUkkxRE

2012 WEST REGION CHAMPION MAKAKILO KAPOLEI HONOLEI HALE LITTLE LEAGUE, KAPOLEI, HAWAII

1.   Sport must be fun.

• We enjoy success but we don’t enjoy striking out three times in a row. Skill is very important to the realization of fun.
• We enjoy learning new things but we don’t enjoy boredom.
• We enjoy respect but we don’t enjoy terror, threats and negatives.

2.  Keep competition in perspective. Educating your child is key.

• Only put your child in competitive situations with evenly matched opponents. S
• S eparate performance from self-worth.
• Better to lose and do your personal best than win and play ugly.
• Better to lose to a good opponent and learn what you need to do to get better than to win against someone who can’t play and learning nothing new.

3.  Skill is a function of repetition and a key to having fun.

• Kids learn/teach themselves.
• Good teachers help.
• Imitation is an important learning method —  take your child to see others play.

4.  Help your child find a sport that is just right for her.

• Commit to a certain time period
• Commit to skill-learning before you give up.
• Make the deal before you play

5.  You can and should coach your child.

• It’s not hard to be better than a six-year-old
• It’s n ot hard to teach.

6.  Lead by example as a spectator and as a cheerleader.

• Be positive toward your child.
• Be positive to all other children and their parents.

7.  Deliver value messages over and over again. They will sink in!

• ”It’s important how you play the game.”
• ”How you play says something about who you are. If you cheat, you are dishonest. If you argue about calls, you are a whiner.”
• Deliver messages in a non-judgmental, matter of fact way with no anger evident.

8.  There are many ways you can encourage your child to participate in sport without forcing it.

• Take them with you when you play…they want to be like you.
• Make play fun.
• Take them to watch others play. Buy books about sport.
• Give gifts that say “I think you can do it!”

9.  Get involved in their sport experience.

• Join your child’s league governance, etc.
• Make sure coaches and officials are certified and educated.

10.  Select coaches who you respect, admire and trust.

• Do not tolerate bad people…no matter how many games your child’s team wins.
• Make sure the team your child plays on has children of similar skill.

Society tends to define young girls by their activities, such as: She is an equestrian, a softball player, or a gymnast. You should make sure your daughter has something positive in her life by which her friends and community can define her. Ask her what her passion is and help her explore it more deeply. Often that passion revolves around a sport she is drawn to. You can use this activity to teach her more self-control and patience.

You model self-discipline by the way you act, and you foster your daughter’s self-discipline and control by her involvement in something that demands:

• Practicing a skill for a long time, such as playing golf or tennis
• Working on a long-range project, such as building a piece of furniture
• Investing much of her time and money in something, such as starting a collection

You can also watch what natural athletic talent your daughter may have and build on the passion she feels for the sport. You can coach her, or by following your own passion, guide your girl into rooting for your favorite teams, or get her to imitate your own sports prowess. She may end up loving something you excelled in or take the sport to a whole new level. You should always include both your boys and girls in the sports training you provide and the sports equipment you install in your backyard. In fact, you should make no distinction between how much time you devote to your son’s little league games and your daughter’s track meets. Also give your daughter more “masculine” presents, such as a baseball mitt or a chemistry set.

You can teach your daughter many valuable life lessons through sports. For example, how not to take tryouts too seriously, how to be a good winner and a good loser, and how to throw herself into a pursuit she loves just for the sake of it. Hobbies can also bind fathers and daughters.

Sharing Hobbies

Most of all, share an interest that allows you and your daughter to keep up with each other and with your lives over time. There is always an occasion to talk during a fishing trip — at least during the drive to the lake and back home — or a camping excursion. Traveling together, by bike, boat, car, on foot, or via “arm-chair” can also nurture your father-daughter connection. During those travels, you and your girl will have many chances to solve problems. You can teach your daughter how to create something out of nothing, or how to make the best out of any situation, no matter how bad. One example is calling a flat tire an opportunity for adventure. Documenting your travels and putting them on a CD, rehashing your trips and creating a blog, or videotaping your visits to the zoo or the planetarium will give her many precious memories.

Sharing Hopes

Spending an evening with you gazing at the stars will nurture your girl’s sense of awe. As you explain your view of the universe, and your hopes and dreams for her, she will feel free to tell you of her hopes and dreams while developing an allegiance to something greater: humankind’s universal striving to be the best. Things worth doing and realizing one’s dreams can take a lot of time and work, but each step along the way, you can help your daughter soar.

by: Erika V. Shearin Karres, Ed.D.

The relationship between women and sports seems like it should be simple. Sports involve the use of our bodies; women have bodies; therefore, women and sports should naturally relate.

But like many relationships, this one is more complicated than it seems to be on the surface. To be sure, the coupling of women and sports, at least in this country, is stronger than at any point in our history. When I was growing up in suburban Trenton, New Jersey, in the 1960s and ’70s, I had relatively limited opportunities to play organized sports. By contrast, there is a wide range of offerings available to today’s young girls, who can play sports freely at the grassroots level and then, thanks to Title IX, move on to established, wide-ranging and, in some cases, highly sophisticated programs in high school and college.

In the same way, I don’t recall my mother (or any of her friends) sweating it out side-by-side with the guys at the health club like I do; her recreational life didn’t extend much beyond her weekly bowling league. Who could have predicted in 1970 that only a generation later, adult women would be exercising in droves, and throwing themselves with vigor into athletic pursuits as far-flung (and rigorous) as triathlons, martial arts and Pilates?

Girls and women today have also taken to sports as fans in numbers that were unimaginable when Title IX became law in 1972. There was a time when you wouldn’t expect to see men and women cheering in unison at a sports venue, but sporting events in 2010 routinely feature a healthy share of passionate female spectators. And through the wonders of technology, girls and women — just like boys and men — now follow sports anyplace and anytime, with unprecedented ease.

But while women and sports seem closer than ever, elements of the relationship are sometimes hard to reconcile. In our post-Title IX world, the old stereotypes and barriers which historically distanced women and girls from sports are largely gone, but differences persist in the way American males and females participate in, consume and think about sports, which in turn affects health and fitness trends, media imagery and coverage, and strategies for companies trying to turn sports into profitable business ventures. The future of women’s sports will be shaped by the way these differences are addressed and by the effectiveness with which women’s sports proponents can meld the gains of the past 40 years with the needs, sensibilities and realities of today’s world.

A good place to start is with our girls. While it’s true that hordes of girls today participate avidly in sports in their formative years, extracurriculars and other diversions wind up competing for their attention, leaving many to drop out by the time they reach middle school or high school. Keeping our girls physically active as they move into adulthood emerges as a critical challenge.

And while it’s now perfectly normal for adult women to play or watch pretty much whatever sport suits their fancy, they may struggle to find enough hours in a day to fit sports in, as the demands in their lives (particularly for working mothers) often make sports of any kind a luxury, one more activity to shoehorn into an all-too busy day. Convincing women that sports are integral to a healthy and balanced life, and that making time for regular athletic activity shouldn’t be just a goal, but a priority, is an equally important imperative.

Evolving, and sometimes conflicting, definitions of femininity complicate matters. Most people are no longer put off by the sight of women sweating profusely or diving after loose balls, and an athletic, muscular build has begun to be accepted as a representation of feminine beauty. But representations of traditional gender roles persist: Bare-bellied cheerleaders endure as sideline fixtures at men’s sports competitions, and in sports (like football) where the machismo quotient is especially high, the opportunities for women who yearn to participate are still limited.

Time will tell whether the female athlete will ever replace the supermodel or actress as the prototype of femininity and beauty. Until that day comes, much good can come from promoting the notions that sweat has no gender; that strength is a form of beauty; and that health brought on by physical activity is an ideal to which all girls and women should aspire.

Women’s professional athletics are another important part of today’s equation. The progress since I was a girl has been real: women’s tennis and golf are now fixtures on the pro sports landscape, and after decades in the shadows, women’s basketball and soccer have found their way onto the scene, something many never dreamed possible.

But although the battles for acceptance which marked the 1970s and ’80s have been largely won, they’ve been replaced by another challenge: how to convert the feel-good vibe of “with you in spirit” into cold, hard revenue, so that women’s sports leagues can endure as viable businesses. The protections of Title IX, which helped make the pro outlets possible, do not reach beyond federally-funded educational institutions, so the future of the leagues will be wholly left to the realities of the marketplace. In the post-Title IX age, progress at the elite level will ride on the adeptness with which women’s sports leaders can marry what’s appealingly feminine with what’s impressively athletic, what’s edgy and controversial with what’s mainstream and wholesome — and in our culture of celebrity, whether women’s sports “products” can be turned into compelling entertainment, the kind that busy fans (women and girls among them) will make time for and pay real money to see.

Women and sports: their relationship is complicated. Part of the story has been told, but chapters remain to be written. For the believers, new frontiers beckon. It’s an exciting time.

Val Ackerman – ESPN

Whenever you see a girl shoot the winning basket think of Edith Green. Whenever you see the words “Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972,” know that four decades ago none of that existed. And whenever you see a woman score a soccer goal think of Patsy Mink. Learn more about the pioneering Hawaiian Congresswoman by reading below

Patsy Mink was one of the principal authors of the Education Amendments of 1972, largely referred to as Title IX, which was later renamed the Patsy T. Mink Equal Opportunity in Education Act, after her death in 2002.

As the first Asian American woman and woman of color to serve on the United States Congress, she battled gender discrimination and racism from the very start.

The native Hawaiian played basketball for Maui High School, but was never allowed to play full court because the school believed that it would be too arduous for girls. After her college years at the University of Hawaii, Mink applied to medical school but received twelve rejections due to what she believed to be gender discrimination.

She then decided to opt for law school, but continued to face sexism when she was denied a job at a law firm because she was a married woman. She tried to start her own practice, but government officials only allowed residents of Hawaii to take the bar exam. Although Mink had been born and raised in Hawaii, her husband hadn’t, making her a nonresident of Hawaii. She had to fight for her right to take the bar exam. When she won and passed the exam, she became the first Japanese American woman lawyer in female Hawaiian history.

Mink was the kind of woman who faced endless challenges from society, but she never gave in. In the words of Peggy Simpson, WeNews correspondent, “when one door closed, she pushed another one open.”

Her personal and professional experiences dealing with gender discrimination drove Mink to push for the ratification of Title IX, one of her greatest contribution to the United States.

It began in 1971 when she was Congresswoman Patsy Mink. She and Edith Green, a fellow congresswoman from Oregon, were given the chance to help other women pursue their dreams without gender discrimination, and they took it. It wasn’t a walk in the park, however. Title IX was highly controversial, and although some supported the law, others thought it would be too dangerous—”forcing” schools to accept women would ruin American education, some felt.

Mink and other gender equality advocates withstood the criticism and worked hard to pass Title IX. They won when Congress passed a final version of the bill in June 1972, and President Richard Nixon signed it into law on June 23rd. However, the fight was not over.

It was July 1975 when one congressman argued that gym classes should be able to separate girls and boys. But history shows that separate is certainly not equal. During the debate in the House of Representatives, one vote was needed to stop the change, and that one vote was Patsy Mink’s.

The battle was still not over, though, as it had to be approved by the Senate, as well. Although Mink was not in Washington to help persuade senators to reject the House’s change, her supporters stood by her efforts, chanting, “Give Women a Sporting Chance!” The Senate rejected the changes, but the House had to vote on Title IX once again. This time, the House listened to Mink’s supporters, and followed their advice. The proposed changes were voted against, and the law went into effect across the country soon thereafter.

However, there have been many times in the last forty years when it has been challenged. People have tried to change the law or abolish it completely. Title IX has gone back to Congress many more times than most other laws—24 times by 2007.

Although Title IX is safe for now, “[w]e all need to be reminded that since Title IX was put in place by a legislative body, it can be taken away by a legislative body,” Mink said.

Mink served as Congresswoman of Hawaii from 1965 to 1977 and again from 1990 to 2002. She was a democrat who supported social welfare state and had a huge impact on the national level.

“You were not elected to Congress, in my interpretation of things, to represent your district, period,” Mink said. “You are national legislators.”

She was an influential member of the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, Committee on Education and Labor, Budget Committee and other government institutions. Mink always stood by her liberal values regarding civil rights, education and welfare.

Mink perfectly embodies the spirit of the women’s movement of the 1920′s. She was outspoken, daring and honest. She was a true champion of women’s rights, social justice and civil rights. Her legacy will continue to live on, but only with the perseverance and determination she instilled in the future generation.

More Here:

http://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/home/she-network/education/patsy-mink