Fifty years later, Title IX slogan ‘Give women a sporting chance’ still propels advocates

Editor’s note: Ahead of the 50th anniversary of Title IX, a new podcast from NBC News and NBC Sports called “In Their Court” examines the impact of this legislation through the lens of women’s basketball. The first two episodes are available to download now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. New episodes in the five-part series will be released each Monday. 

In July 1972, armed with newly enacted Title IX legislation and boxes of bright yellow buttons with clever complementing slogans, a young Margaret Dunkle set about her new role in Washington, D.C., as a researcher with Association of American College’s Project on the Status and Education of Women.

Her task? Explore just how well schools, colleges and universities matched up under the new statutory requirement, which for the first time under federal civil rights law, prohibited sex-based discrimination in any school or education program that receives funding from the federal government.

Those 37 words, passed as part of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, read: “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”

“We had these buttons, and we were wearing them up and down the halls of Capitol Hill,” remembers Dunkle, speaking on a new podcast from NBC News and NBC Sports called “In Their Court,” which explores Title IX through the rich history of women’s basketball 50 years after the legislation was passed into law. “We were passing them out like gumdrops, and kind of came up with these slogans. They’re kind of iconic and they’re almost 50 years