Victory at a Cost

It was meant to be about fairness, Savanna Duchala points out, about providing girls like her with more--and more equal--opportunities to play sports.

But it hasn’t quite worked out that way. And now, the Modesto teenager says, she and other athletes in parts of Northern and Central California face the painful task of choosing between their favorite sports.

“It’s not fair,” groans Savanna, 15, who plays soccer and runs track at Modesto High School.

A gender-equity complaint to civil rights investigators at the U.S. Department of Education is forcing high schools across a wide swath of the state to move the girls’ soccer season from winter to spring--or to shift the boys from fall play to the wet, chilly days of winter as well.

But in a signal of how much women’s sports participation has bloomed in the nearly 30 years since Title IX banned sex discrimination in many school activities, some players, parents and coaches are still unhappy: The new soccer schedule will cut into the softball, track and swimming seasons.

And those are sports popular with many soccer-playing girls.

The moves, which stem from a complaint filed three years ago by two Napa-area parents, are intended to fix inequities in playing conditions for girls, who have had to play in mud and rain in the northern half of the state. For the most part, boys in the same areas have enjoyed the milder conditions of fall.

Told to fix the problem, some leagues have decided to shift their girls’ seasons, while others are moving their boys’ seasons, with most of the changes effective next school year. (The southern half of the state, where high school girls and boys play winter soccer, is not affected.)

In Modesto, Manteca and elsewhere, hardly anyone seems satisfied.

Athletic directors worry about the effects on field space, referees and postseason tournaments. Parents of boys and girls say the shifts could hurt their children’s chances for scholarships. And at least a few girls say they actually prefer winter soccer.

“We like playing in the mud and the rain,” insists Stephanie Bucknam, 16, Modesto High’s goalkeeper. “It just isn’t a problem for us.”

Nonetheless, the changes were mandated after investigators for the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights found unequal treatment of soccer-playing girls and boys in two regions: the North Coast (which quickly adjusted schedules for the current year) and the giant Sac-Joaquin area (where the shifts--amid protests--are underway.)

Each area makes up one of the 10 districts designated by the California Interscholastic Federation, which governs high school sports. But many more leagues and teams were involved in the Sac-Joaquin area, which includes 158 high schools, and stretches from Grass Valley to Merced, and from Napa to the Nevada border, said Jack Hayes, the federation’s executive director.

“There was just no solution that was going to satisfy everyone,” he said. “But we had to resolve the question of disparity.”

And that is exactly as it should be, said Sharon Lahmon and Patty Arvin, the parents who set all this in motion.

The fundamental issue, the two women say, is not about how tough the changes are for anyone affected by them; it’s about equality.

Since the advent in 1972 of Title IX, which bans sex discrimination in any educational program or activity that receives federal funds, women have made significant gains in academics and athletics, according to a variety of studies.

And nearly 10 times as many American girls--about 2.6 million--compete in high school sports these days as did in 1971, according to the New York-based Women’s Sports Foundation.

Lahmon’s own battle began more than eight years ago in Fairfield, just east of Napa, when her daughter wanted to play soccer but discovered there was no girls’ team. Boys at the school, Armijo High School, had had a soccer team for nearly 20 years.

Undeterred, a group of girls and parents started their own team, Lahmon said, although they had to pay for their equipment and transportation, while the boys’ program was fully funded. That first year, in 1993, the girls even had to wear the boys’ old uniforms.

“But the girls and parents were willing to do all that, just to be able to play,” Lahmon said.

The problems began in 1995, when the Monticello Empire League decided, without consulting the soccer teams or parents, to switch the girls’ season from spring to winter. The league said the decision was based on the greater availability of fields and other resources in the winter; too many sports were being played in the spring.

Two years later, after watching the girls’ team endure freezing, muddy conditions that hurt their level of play and ability to compete, Lahmon and Arvin filed a complaint with the Office for Civil Rights. They were represented by the Los Angeles-based California Women’s Law Center.

After an investigation, the federal office confirmed that disparities existed and told the federation to fix the problem in any league where boys and girls played soccer in seasons that were not “equivalent” in the conditions players faced.

“We said they could remedy it by moving the boys to winter, moving the girls to fall or spring, or providing the girls with equivalent conditions in the winter,” said Pat Shelton, the main, San Francisco-based investigator on the case.

But after an initial attempt to do the latter, which would have required providing the girls with tents, heaters and heavier uniforms, and redoing fields to provide better drainage, the Monticello Empire League in October decided to move its girls’ teams to the spring.

Now, other leagues in the two affected areas are doing the same, or moving their boys’ teams.

“The federal government does not want to get into the business of running high school sports,” Shelton said. “It’s inappropriate for us to do that sort of micromanagement, but we do have an obligation to assure that schools that receive federal funds operate their programs without creating disparities that favor one sex or the other.”

Some of those involved argue that it’s still unequal, with girls in many areas now having only one winter sport to play--basketball--while boys have basketball and wrestling.

Others worry that some boys and some girls will lose out now on the chance for postseason tournament play, with the federation leaning toward making spring the only time for a Sac-Joaquin girls’ championship and winter the only time for a championship for boys. Leagues that have chosen to schedule their play outside the recommended times may miss out, Hayes said.

Savanna Duchala and many of her friends are struggling to figure out which sports they can still play, given the shifting seasons. But at least one girl, Julianna Uhrik, 14, says she likes the new schedule; she can now play soccer in the spring and try basketball in the winter.

But all those issues, difficult as they are, are for others to figure out, Lahmon and Arvin say.

“It’s not a sports issue, it’s a civil rights issue,” Arvin said. “And you don’t violate the law just because some kids have to make a choice.”