Title IX and the Protection of Pregnant and Parenting College Students

Realities and Challenges

Catherine L. Riley, Alexis Hutchinson, Carley Dix

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781000589283
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Higher Education

This book explores the discrepancies among what protections Title IX provides to pregnant and parenting students, what colleges communicate, and what pregnant and parenting students actually experience. To actually protect pregnant and parenting students, the authors argue that a school must provide multifaceted support that is effectively communicated to an entire campus community, including students who are parenting, who are pregnant, and who may become pregnant.

The first part of the book portrays the realities of pregnancy and parenting in college. The chapters illuminate related Title IX applications, population demographics, how unplanned pregnancies in college occur, and physical and mental health challenges that these students often experience. The authors then discuss what compliance with Title IX legally entails and why meeting it is often an afterthought. In the second half of the book, the authors use mixed-methods research to map the compliance landscapes of three schools in the southeast as examples: a large state school, a mid-size private university, and a small private college.

Offering eye-opening interviews with pregnant and parenting students, interdisciplinary research, and proposals for multifaceted support and communication on college campuses, this volume will engage students, scholars, and activists with an interest in higher education administration, educational policy, reproductive health, bioethics, gender studies, and rhetoric.

Part 1 Context: The Realities of Pregnancy and Parenting in College

1 Introduction to Title IX as It Relates to Pregnancy

DOI: 10.4324/9781003164159-2

In October of her third year of school, while taking a full course load and holding an on-campus job, Carla became pregnant. And then she had a miscarriage. “It was a tough experience emotionally. I did not tell anyone. I told a couple friends in the program a few weeks afterwards. [But it] was very isolating.” Through grief, tears, and loneliness, Carla searched her university’s websites to see if there was any sort of support or accommodations she could get while healing emotionally and physically, but she found nothing. What she did notice, though, was “an unwillingness to acknowledge labor on campus.” So she trudged on, mostly in silence. “I wish I had been able to take time off,” she said disappointedly, “but there’s not a way to do that during the semester.”

Despite having to go to the hospital, Carla continued going to class, doing her work, and not mentioning anything to anyone. It was hard. “One professor was really on me about all these deadlines and a program [I help with]. I wanted to be like, ‘Look, I’m dealing with all this.’ But I didn’t. I didn’t want to seem unprofessional.” Although she was hurting, Carla carried on quietly.

There is something bleak and depressing about sitting in a meeting knowing you are currently miscarrying. It would have been nice to have that week. Plus, your hormones increase so dramatically those first weeks [of pregnancy], then your hormones decrease so dramatically that week. It was extremely emotional, and you can’t rein it in. When you have a baby it’s a lot of positive emotions, but when you’re miscarrying it’s just negative. It would have been nice to be home that week. Those first couple days felt like brink of despair.

Nobody at Carla’s school knew how she was feeling nor what she was struggling with, but she was likely not the only person at her school experiencing such suffering. As soon will be explained, pregnancy, childbirth, miscarriage, and abortion are all common, even among college populations. Students experiencing more than one pregnancy is also common, and this was not the only time Carla experienced pregnancy while in school.

The next year, Carla became pregnant again. Because of her previous miscarriage, she was even more reluctant to tell people, waiting until she was nearly seven months pregnant. Recalling those months, Carla shared that not being visibly pregnant “made it a lot easier from a gender politics standpoint.” She told us, “I think if you’re walking around [visibly] pregnant on campus or in your building it affects how people see you and respond to you. [Hiding my pregnancy] was a good thing because there have been no different reactions from people.” But then again, as she knows from her miscarriage experience, hiding her pregnancies and remaining silent also perpetuated a lack of much-needed accommodations.

When Carla finally did tell her professors and classmates that she was pregnant, their reactions were mixed. Her advisor has been “really good,” albeit different:

She has a son who is six so it’s recent in her mind. But she was more panicked about it than me. She kind of had a tone that was odd because it was like I messed up [by choosing to have a child while in school] … I don’t want to panic her, so I focus on schooling and don’t open up about my pregnancy or child as much.

Others’ reactions were also mixed:

Another professor has four kids, and she’s been more supportive. We regularly talk and work together, she came to my baby shower, and made cute clothes for the baby. She wasn’t always so friendly, but having a baby has changed that in her.

Still, Carla feels the need to constantly be on guard so that others do not judge her poorly. “There’s a lot of professors in our department that have no kids or have just one they had when they were 40, which is a lot different.” Feeling isolated contributes to her challenges. At her school, Carla knows of few other pregnant or parenting students. “People look at me like I’m kind of weird.”

That Carla felt the need to hide her medical conditions to avoid negative social judgment, that she was not aware of support or accommodations for pregnant, parenting, or miscarrying students at her school, and that she felt required to go to her classes and campus job even while experiencing major medical trauma is concerning. Under Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 and the accompanying regulations and guidelines published by the US Department of Education, pregnant and parenting students like Carla are entitled to protection from discrimination and support in continuing their education. Carla, for example, should have been allowed excused absences due to pregnancy or childbirth, including miscarriage, as long as her doctor said it was necessary. Her school should have provided easy access to clear policies protecting pregnant and parenting students that help avoid sex discrimination. She should not have had to hide her experiences, fearing discrimination.¹ So why did all of these events occur?

Although schools are required to notify faculty, staff, and students about their Title IX policies, including informing students that Title IX applies to pregnant and parenting students, this clearly does not always happen nor is the communication always effective. Even if information is provided somewhere, students might not see it and schools might not put protections into practice. Laws are of little service unless they are communicated, applied, and evaluated for effectiveness. In the case of Title IX, when it is not upheld pregnant and parenting students go without much-needed protections, rights, and support. This is significant because there are nearly four million parenting undergraduate students attending US colleges, and many pregnant students too.² This number includes four-year institutions, junior colleges, community colleges, and for-profit institutions. However, this figure does not begin to account for graduate students. Even if there were only two such students, though, their rights and protection matter.

Convincing schools that this population matters is difficult because it often goes unnoticed (for various reasons discussed in Chapter 2) despite its significant size. The Institute for Women’s Policy Research estimates that one in five undergraduates are student-parents.³ Although often considered “non-traditional students,” undergraduate student-parents are anything but atypical. Even when considering traditional four-year colleges only, the number of pregnant and parenting students is still high. Forty percent of the many unplanned pregnancies that occur each year are among college-aged women.⁴ Regardless of age, stage of life, or level of education, all pregnant and parenting students have protections. But do they know this?

Students we spoke with at three universities all had the same answer when we asked them if they had heard of Title IX and if they knew about their rights as pregnant and parenting students. Their answer, resoundingly, was no. Many of them were not even familiar with Title IX in general, offering statements such as:

• “I am ashamed to admit that I don’t know what it is other than generally an equality measure. I don’t know what it is in practice or in word.”
• “I’ve never heard of Title IX. They didn’t tell me of rights as a pregnant and parenting student.”
• “No, but I wish I knew.”
• “NO, not at all. I still am not aware [after graduation].”
• “No, not at all.”
• “I remember being a Title IX athlete [the first time I went to school]. I joined the team for free to balance out the football team. That’s all I know [about Title IX] and that’s probably wrong.”
• “I know I have to take training every year [for a campus job]. I know that it helps me in some way.”

Even when students do not know about their rights, however, their rights continue to exist, and schools are expected to uphold them.

Yet, little research exists mapping these realities. Keri Weed, Jody Nicholson, and Jaelyn Farris explore youth pregnancies in Teen Pregnancy and Parenting. Mary Ann Mason and Nicholas Wolfinger explore pregnancy and parenting among graduate students and faculty in Do Babies Matter? Gender and Family in the Ivory Tower. Focusing on athletics and sexual assault, Elizabeth Busch and William Thro have published Title IX: The Transformation of Sex Discrimination in Education. Deborah Brake has published Getting in the Game: Title IX and the Women’s Sports Revolution, which contains a chapter on student-athlete pregnancies. And Jennifer Gray has published multiple articles on college-aged women’s experiences with unplanned pregnancies. Beyond these major studies, however, little else exists that focuses specifically on Title IX and its protection of pregnant and parenting college students. Likewise, little exists to help inform college students of their rights and inform universities of what compliance with Title IX looks like.

This book aims to help schools uphold Title IX as it relates to pregnancy and parenting and to help administrators, faculty, and students alike all better understand and prepare for the realities surrounding pregnancy and parenting in college. Doing this necessitates that we first share with readers what Title IX is, including its genesis, development, and function pertaining to pregnant and parenting students. Following this brief history of Title IX, we discuss the specific aims of this book, our methods of research, and the chapters included. Protection for pregnant and parenting students under Title IX may not be new, but not enough has been done to ensure it is effectively applied. We hope to help.

The Evolution of Title IX

Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972 was signed into law on June 23, 1972 by President Richard Nixon.⁵ It was a critical time in the women’s rights movement, and the passage of Title IX was seen as a huge measure of progress. At the time, proponents and opponents of Title IX were aware of the effect this prohibition against sex discrimination would have on women’s admission to college, degrees obtained by women, employment of women, and even to a lesser extent women’s involvement in athletics. However, they could not foresee how far-reaching the effects of Title IX would be, and how the focus of this law would constantly evolve to meet the changing landscape of sex discrimination concerns.

Preceding Laws

Prior to the passing of Title IX, there were multiple laws passed during the 1960s that set the foundation for Title IX. Title IX was able to build off the strengths of these laws but also fill some of the loopholes in these laws. In 1963, President Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act into law—an amendment to the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938.⁶ This law was the first of its kind to address one of the tangible ways in which women experience inequality within the workforce. The Equal Pay Act requires that male and female employees who work substantially equal jobs in the same workplace receive equal pay for equal work. Following the Equal Pay Act was the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act states:

No person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color, or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.⁷

However, Title VI does not include sex or gender. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin for employers with 15 or more employees.

On September 24, 1965, President Johnson reinforced the Civil Rights Act when he enacted Executive Order No. 11246, which prohibits employers, who engage in over 10,000 dollars’ worth of federal business, from discriminating on the basis of race, color, religion, or national origin in employment decisions.⁸ The order also requires government contractors with 51 or more employees and 50,000 dollars in government contracts to take “affirmative action” in ensuring that equal employment opportunity exists within all levels of their business. President Johnson amended the order to include sex via Executive Order No. 11375 on October 17, 1967.⁹ These laws and executive orders set the foundation for Title IX.

Title IX Beginnings and Passage

On January 31, 1970, Dr...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Brief Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• Part 1 Context: The Realities of Pregnancy and Parenting in College
• Part 2 Introduction to the Case Studies
• Bibliography
• Index