| WASHINGTON
- June 6 - Young women and girls face
widespread sex discrimination in high school vocational and
technical education programs across the country. Pervasive sex
segregation, sexual harassment in the classroom, discrimination in
counseling and recruiting, and other gender-based bias are creating
serious barriers to their future earning power, according to a
nationwide investigation released today by the National Women's Law
Center (NWLC). NWLC examined problems in depth in Arizona,
California, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan,
Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina, and Washington
State. (View state information at http://www.nwlc.org or call
202-588-5180.)
As a result of these findings, NWLC today issued a report and
filed 12 Petitions for Compliance Review -- one in each regional
office of the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights.
The petitions request Title IX investigations of -- and demand
remedies for -- sex discrimination in vocational and technical
education across the country. Title IX is the law, passed 30 years
ago this month, that bars sex discrimination in all aspects of
federally funded education.
Thirty years after Title IX, boys are still being steered toward
courses that lead to traditionally male, and higher paying, careers
in technology and the trades, while girls are clustered in programs
that lead to lower paying jobs in cosmetology, child care and the
like. National patterns of sex segregation, based on data in the
12 states, shows that 96 percent of cosmetology students are
female, as are 87 percent of those enrolled in child care courses,
and 86 percent of those enrolled in health aide preparation
courses. Meanwhile, boys comprise over 90 percent of the students
enrolled in carpentry, automotive, and plumbing. The pattern of
sex segregation is even worse in some states. For example, in
Florida, 99 percent of the students in cosmetology are female,
while 100 percent of the students taking plumbing are male.
The pervasive sex segregation of female students into
traditionally female programs severely compromises their future
earning power. For example, cosmetologists earn a median hourly
salary of $8.49 and child care workers earn a median hourly salary
of $7.43. In contrast, students in the predominantly male,
higher-wage careers can earn median hourly salaries of almost $20
as plumbers, electricians or mechanical drafters.
Beyond the data showing stark patterns of sex segregation, NWLC
obtained additional information that underscores the sex
discrimination that girls face in vocational education. This
includes teachers who help male students get summer jobs but do not
help female students; guidance counselors who steer female students
into cosmetology based on their lower expectations for them; and
schools that fail to protect girls from sexual harassment.
Moreover, half of the states across the country have not met their
legal duty to designate a Title IX coordinator to carry out the
states' responsibilities under the law.
Young women enrolled in traditionally female programs often
receive inferior educations. Today's actions follow NWLC's
finding last year that New York City's vocational schools were
highly sex segregated and that the predominantly female schools,
unlike the male schools, offered almost no advanced math or science
courses. Special technology programs, like Cisco Networking
Academies, which lead to industry certification in computer
networking and jobs that pay between $42,000 and over $100,000 per
year, were placed in the predominantly male schools, but were not
available in the schools attended by young women.
"High school vocational and technical education programs can
provide a path to economic independence for many young women and
girls. Thirty years after Title IX, it is unconscionable that
their dreams and futures are still being shortchanged," said Marcia
D. Greenberger, NWLC co-president.
"Girls in vocational and technical programs suffer
discriminatory practices that discourage them from progressing and
succeeding. These girls have to tolerate instructors who really
don't take them seriously and deny them the experience of any real
training. Instead, they are given the attendance book or other
administrative duties while the boys are being trained with the
tools," said Geri Harston, a Chicago electrician and recruiter for
the nation's second largest electrical apprenticeship program.
Melissa Barbier, director of girls' programs at the Chicago
Women in Trades, said, "I've seen first hand the obstacles girls
must overcome to enter the trades. But I've also seen the positive
results when schools make the effort to provide an encouraging
environment for girls in the nontraditional trades, and when they
inform girls about the financial benefits and consequences of their
career choices."
For more information, view "Title IX and Equal Opportunity in
Vocational and Technical Education: A Promise Still Owed to the
Nation's Young Women" at http://www.nwlc.org.
The National Women's Law Center is a non-profit organization
that has been working since 1972 to advance and protect women's
legal rights. The Center focuses on major policy areas of
importance to women and their families including economic security,
education, employment and health, with special attention given to
the concerns of low-income women.
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