ORANGE COUNTY PERSPECTIVE : A Cheer for Gender Equality

The state appeals court in Santa Ana deserves three cheers for ruling that schools must set the bar at the same level for both cheerleaders and athletes.

The 4th District Court of Appeal decided last week in favor of Melissa Fontes, now a 20-year-old college student in Oregon. When Fontes was a student at Woodbridge High School in Irvine, she was thrown off the cheerleading team for getting an F in a chemistry course.

Her overall average was higher than the 2.5 minimum, but Irvine Unified School District rules required that cheerleaders and participants in other non-academic extracurricular activities have no failing grades. Athletes were held to lesser standards, being required merely to keep a 2.0 average and pass at least four courses in the previous quarter.

Fontes sued the district, arguing for equal treatment. A Superior Court judge ruled against her, but the appeals court correctly took her side.

The district claimed that cheerleaders were role models in a way that defensive tackles or first basemen were not and so should be held to a higher standard. That is a dubious argument, because athletes obviously represent their school just as much as cheerleaders.

The different standards also had the effect of discriminating by gender, since cheerleaders are usually female and athletes historically have been male.

Presiding Justice David Sills sent the district the proper message in pointing out that it need not lower standards for cheerleaders. Instead, it could raise them for athletes. Why not require a 2.5 average and no failing grades to play basketball or soccer? That would treat all students the same, and might also improve academic performance by strengthening motivation for doing better in class.

The justices also were right to uphold the basic power of school districts to set minimum requirements in the classroom for those wanting to participate in school activities outside of class.

The first job of the schools is to educate, not to field football teams or squads to cheer the players on. As Justice Sheila Prell Sonenshine aptly put it, “The tail should not wag the dog.”