Players for Club Rowing and Varsity Beach Volleyball Sue Oregon for Denying Women Equal Opportunity to Participate, Equal Treatment, and Equal Athletic Financial Aid
By: Angela Redding | Los Angeles, CA | Hollywood Beat magazine | January 10, 2024
Photo: GoDucks.com
32 female student-athletes filed a comprehensive, over 100-page class action lawsuit December 1, 2023 alleging that the University of Oregon violated Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 by denying women equal treatment and benefits, equal athletic aid, and equal opportunities to participate in varsity intercollegiate athletics. Twenty-six members of the U.S. women’s varsity beach volleyball team and six members of the women’s club rowing squad filed the lawsuit.
District Court in Eugene, Oregon, seeks “to hold Oregon accountable for discriminating against all of its female student- athletes and potential student-athletes, make Oregon pay damages to the women it has deprived and is depriving of equal treatment and equal athletic financial aid, and stop Oregon from violating Title IX in the future.”
Sex Discrimination is Forbidden
Sex discrimination is forbidden by federal civil rights law Title IX for the University of Oregon and any other educational institutions that accept federal funding. The women’s club rowing team members “seek to hold Oregon accountable for depriving them and all present and future female students at Oregon of equal opportunities to participate in varsity athletics,” as stated in the complaint, while the women’s beach volleyball team members “aim to hold Oregon accountable for depriving them and all varsity female student-athletes of equal treatment and equal athletic financial aid in violation of Title IX.“
Title IX Has Been the Law for More Than Fifty Years
“Title IX has been the law for more than fifty years. Oregon needs to comply with it, now,” said Arthur H. Bryant of Bailey & Glasser, LLP in Oakland, CA, lead counsel for the women. “Three months ago, The Oregonian wrote about the school’s potential discrimination issues in a front-page investigative report: “Oregon Ducks beach volleyball players detail disparate treatment that experts say could violate Title IX.” But the school refuses to change its ways or even admit there is a problem. It has taught its women athletes what the history of Title IX has shown: If women want equality, they need to fight for it. So that’s what the women at Oregon are doing.”
Principal Defendant
beach volleyball player
(Photo: GoDucks.com)
Principal Defendant The varsity beach volleyball team’s captain, Ashley Schroeder, stated, “Based on the way the beach volleyball team has been treated, female athletes at Oregon do not need much food or water, good or clean clothes or uniforms, scholarships, medical treatment or mental health services, their own facilities, a locker room, proper transportation, or other basic necessities. Male athletes are treated incredibly better in almost every respect. This week, we could not practice because, sadly and disturbingly, someone died near the public courts we have to use in Amazon Park. We cannot use the restrooms there because they’re not safe and, sometimes, people are in the stalls using drugs. But the men’s teams have full scholarships, multi-million-dollar budgets, and professional-level, state-of-the-art facilities. I love the University of Oregon, but this hurtful, outrageous sex discrimination has to stop.”
Male student-athletes vs Female student-athletes – May cost University of Oregon $4.5 Million in Damages
The lawsuit demonstrates that the school is denying women equitable treatment and athletic help by using data from Oregon itself. If Oregon is to be believed, women make up 49% of student-athletes, but they receive only 25% of the state’s athletics budget and 15% of its recruitment budget, based on data from the Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act that the state has confirmed to the federal government as accurate. Oregon would have to pay nearly $4.5 million in damages to its female student-athletes to make up for the disproportionate athletic aid it paid its male student-athletes from 2017–18 to 2021–22, the last five years for which data is available to the public. And the uneven spending doesn’t stop.
Plaintiff Elise Haverland, the Women’s Club Rowing Team Captain
Plaintiff Elise Haverland, the women’s club rowing team captain, said, “We love this school, but, in addition to treating its women athletes unfairly, it is also depriving us and other women of equal opportunities to participate. Oregon’s own numbers show it needs to add at least 94 varsity women athletes to reach proportionality. That includes a women’s rowing team and more.”
Female Student-Athletes Did Not Go to School Imagining They Would Sue Their University
“We are proud to represent these courageous women who have decided to stand up and fight for the equality Title IX requires and against the sex discrimination that Title IX prohibits,” said co-counsel Lori Bullock of Bailey & Glasser LLP in Des Moines, Iowa. “These young women did not go to school imagining they would sue their university, but they are committed to fighting for what is right.”
Women’s varsity beach volleyball players Zoe Almanza, Jade Bernal, Kendall Clark, Josie Cole, Vivian Donovan, Halli Fields, Siulolovao Folau, Natasha George, Josie Griffiths, Alexandra Haden, Delaney Hopen, Madelyn Lafollette, Alex Laita, Anastasia Lima, Mia Lopez, Dahlia McAllister, Presley McCaskill, Abigail Plevin, Valerie Peterson, Batia Rotshtein, Savannah Siegrist, Alaina Thomas, Ella Tyus, Carly Wallace and Beatrice Wetton and women’s club rowing team members Claire Daley, Anna Maria Knight, River Ribeiro, Sophia Schmitz, and Sydney Weddle are the other Plaintiffs in the case.
Jennifer Middleton, a local attorney with Johnson Johnson Lucas & Middleton in Eugene, Oregon, stated, “The students have filed this lawsuit to ensure the university follows the law and treats women athletes fairly. It’s time for the University of Oregon to live up to its principles.”
Joshua Hammack, Cary Joshi, Laura E. Babiak, and Savanna Jones of Bailey & Glasser, LLP in Washington, D.C., and Charleston, WV, also represent the women.
To read the Complaint, click here.
ADVERTISMENT
Leave a Reply