It’s much bigger than Caitlin Clark: Our writer tallies women’s recent gains

Episode transcript

Kendra Nordin Beato: This women’s sports fan is just heartened by the fact that everybody’s talking about women’s sports. And suddenly everybody’s an armchair expert on women’s sports.... The United States has been a leader in recognizing that girls and women deserve opportunities. And sports was one of the surprising results of that, and it just had this tremendous, wonderful ripple effect.

Clayton Collins: That’s Kendra Nordin Beato. 

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Collins: Two years ago this week, Kendra joined us on the very first episode of our summer pilot season. We were still running under our old name, “Rethinking the News.” Kendra, a staff editor at the Monitor since 1999 and the overseer of our intern team, has a deep interest and a lot of experience in food journalism and in women’s sports.

She joined us in June 2022 to talk about the 50th anniversary of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. Part of this episode is an encore of that episode. 

Welcome to “Why We Wrote This,” a podcast about how Monitor journalists approach our work. I’m Clay Collins. A lot has been happening in women’s sports at several levels, and we like that anniversary symmetry. So Kendra is back today. Hey, Kendra.

Nordin Beato: Hey, Clay. Great to be back. 

Collins: We’ve talked a bit off mic lately, because we sit side-by-side in the newsroom, about Caitlin Clark’s dramatic entry into the WNBA and all of the stories that has spawned. And you wrote about that very impressive athlete recently. Mostly today, we’ll be updating that Title IX episode, which we ran right after the cover story you wrote with Tara Adhikari.

On that show, you described what you called Title IX’s braided strands: education, sports, and protections against sexual harassment and assault. And you talked about your own background in sports, and that’s all coming up.

First, though, the newsmaker, Caitlin Clark. A rocky start to her pro career in some ways, though not necessarily in terms of how she’s playing. She’s still making logo 3s. Huge crowds. Hard fouls. What are you seeing?

Nordin Beato: Wow, yeah. Caitlin Clark has become this phenomenon that we only see a few times in our lifetime when you have an athlete that has captured the public imagination quite the way that she has. And a lot of people have been waiting to see [what is] this record-smashing college basketball player going to do when she transitions into the pro leagues with the WNBA and she was first pick. Already the WNBA team, some of them have had to move into larger stadiums in anticipation of playing against Caitlin Clark. The ticket sales are up 93% because of Caitlin Clark and other stars like Angel Reese that have also joined the WNBA this year. People are talking about women’s sports in ways they never have before.

Collins: There are a lot of exciting players in the WNBA. There’s been a little bit of a sense of: Is she being welcomed? And I just wondered [about] your take on that. 

Nordin Beato: I have found these controversies over who’s hip checking Caitlin Clark, slighting her with what comment to be almost entertaining in a way. It’s almost as if people don’t realize these are highly athletic, intense women who are incredibly combative and competitive. And people, it’s almost like they’re shocked. Is it racially motivated? Is it jealousy? Is it: “Got to put this rookie in her place”? Look at any men’s sport. And Tom Brady himself was harassed as a rookie player. I mean, even LeBron James has come to Caitlin’s defense saying that he’s been in that seat before.

Collins: Right. 

Nordin Beato: What’s happened is this fandom has come out of nowhere and just swept up her story. And she’s such a different character than you usually encounter in the WNBA. She’s white. She’s from a red state, rural Iowa. She was born and raised there, went to state college there, broke her records there. And then you have all these other narratives of the WNBA where, you know, predominantly it’s been a Black sport out of urban neighborhoods. And so she’s just an interesting counternarrative character in general. She’s got the public eye on her constantly.

Of course, there’s going to be jealousy. She had all of these endorsement deals before she went pro. And it’s tempting to think: “Oh, the world’s paying attention because a white woman is the one taking the logo 3s.” But I mean, you can’t deny her record. And it’s exciting that people are getting agitated about it. It just goes to show the level of the game has gotten up. I mean, Caitlin Clark might be the tide that’s rising all boats. Well, there are a lot of boats in the harbor already. Big powerful boats. I think we just gotta ride it out a bit and see what happens. 

Collins: OK. So this won’t be quite a lightning round, but I want to go through each of the braids that you described in the first episode. What’s happening around the education strand? These are kind of complicated times for colleges and universities. 

Nordin Beato: Yes. The important thing to remember about Title IX is the hundreds of class action suits that these 37 words launched in the 1970s were all about creating equal opportunity for women in education, you know, more spots in admissions, more women finding jobs in higher education after they graduate from college, more women moving into administrative roles. The Chronicle of Higher [Education] reported that women now sit in the president’s office in 30 percent of the nation’s 146 R1 research universities. And that is a 22 percent increase from 2021. So you have a lot of women now sitting in the highest offices in academia, which means that when they’re making high stakes decisions, they’re doing it in the public eye and under alumni scrutiny. Enter the Israeli-Palestinian protests that swept across college campuses this fall. There were three women Ivy League presidents who were called before Congress to answer to Republican lawmakers about how they handle it on their campuses. So it’s interesting. You’ve got ... we do have more women in positions of power and decisionmaking, but they’re also under intense scrutiny, not unlike Caitlin Clark on the basketball court.

Collins: Right. Big gains and more scrutiny.

And on the sexual harassment and sexual assault piece, this could be a pretty big summer ahead, right?

Nordin Beato: Yes, the Biden administration’s final ruling on Title IX will go into effect on August 1st. And those new regulations have introduced significant shifts in how institutions receiving federal funding are addressing sexual harassment and assault allegations, while also expanding protections for LGBTQ and even pregnant students. This, of course, has launched a pushback from Republican governors who are trying to stop those Title IX regulations from happening. Twenty-six states have filed lawsuits. What the Biden administration left off the table was a proposal on transgender participation on specific men and women athletic teams, although it’s anticipated that could surface after the November elections. That’s a hot button. I mean, Title IX itself has always been this political football, and this is what the Biden administration’s own stamp is on the definitions and applications of the law.

Collins: Right. So a lot of that will be coming to the fore soon. This is the final strand in the braid. What about the women’s sports piece beyond Caitlin Clark? Huge gains there, too, by quite a few measures, right?

Nordin Beato: Yes, yes. I mean first of all, this women’s sports fan is just heartened by the fact that everybody’s talking about women’s sports. And suddenly everybody’s an armchair expert on women’s sports. So, the women’s sports industry is forecasted to break the $1 billion mark this year for the first time in total revenue. Also you’ve got a lot of exciting things happening in pro leagues.

Women’s soccer – it’s always been a leader in women’s pro sports – is set to launch a second league in August. There also was a successful launch this year of a professional women’s hockey league and a professional women’s volleyball league. Last summer, there were 92,000 fans attending an outdoor volleyball match at the University of Nebraska, which set a world record for attendance at a women’s sporting event. It’s also exciting beyond U.S. borders. There was a professional hockey game this spring between Toronto and Montreal that had the highest attendance for a women’s hockey game ever. 

And then there’s the Paris Olympics. This summer, there will be an equal number of men and women athletes represented for the first time in games history. That’s thanks to a quota that the IOC has worked to enforce for decades now. And it really is all thanks, I think, to Title IX because the United States has been a leader in recognizing that girls and women deserve opportunities. And sports was one of the surprising results of that, and it just had this tremendous, wonderful ripple effect. And I think it’s great. 

Collins: That’s great. Just want to point out there is a Caitlin Clark Olympics story, too. And we talked a bit about that off mic. And it seems like another case where the closer you look, the less of a controversy it appears to be. Is that sort of the case?

Nordin Beato: Yeah. So the Monitor’s own Ira Porter, who is heading to Paris this summer to cover the Olympics for us, wrote about it recently to kind of demystify the whole process behind “how does the women’s Olympic team get chosen.” There are many factors that are involved. It is notable that Caitlin Clark, who’s the WNBA first draft pick, did not make the team, but that’s happened before. Aliyah Boston, who was the WNBA rookie of the year last year, is not on the team. So I can’t pretend to know what goes on in a coach’s mind when you sit down to actually pick the Olympic roster. And maybe the fact that there’s this huge fandom and a potential backlash for disappointed fans who are going to watch her ride the bench, you know. Who knows? But again, it’s that singular focus on one player. You’re kind of missing the whole picture. 

Collins: Right. Excellent. Well, thanks, Kendra, for this quick but somehow very comprehensive update on women’s sports since the Title IX anniversary two years ago. As promised, we’re now going to tee up a piece of that June 2022 show on which you spoke with Samantha Laine Perfas, since so much of it stands up. See you back in the newsroom.

Nordin Beato: Thanks, Clay. 

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Samantha Laine Perfas: Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 states: “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.” 

Since its passing on June 23, 1972, it has been applied to everything from education to sports to sexual harassment to transgender rights. The Monitor’s Kendra Nordin Beato and Tara Adhikari reported on the anniversary of this groundbreaking law by tracing the arc of its progress over the past 50 years. 

Today we’re joined by Kendra to talk about this story, and how she went about reporting on the social effects of such a complex piece of legislation.

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Laine Perfas: Kendra, When you started writing this story about Title IX, did you think it would be simple and straightforward?

Nordin Beato: Oh, absolutely not. I knew from the get go that approaching this story was trying to fill a Dixie cup at Niagara Falls. There’s probably been no girl or woman in the United States today who hasn’t been impacted in some way by the passing of Title IX in 1972. 

Laine Perfas: So what would you say were the major pillars that you focused on in your reporting?

Nordin Beato: I see Title IX like a braid that has three strands: education, sports and protections against sexual harassment and sexual assault. The primary motivation for passing Title IX was equal opportunity in education. And then out of that came a new sports culture for girls and women. And then once women and girls were gaining access to environments that had been designed by and for men, they were encountering instances of sexual assault and sexual abuse.  

Laine Perfas: What do you feel is your personal relationship to this story? You mentioned that you consider yourself “a Title IX baby.”

Nordin Beato: Yes, I absolutely am a Title IX baby. I was born in 1971. I was 10 months old when the law was passed. I was part of the group of girls that was pioneering this new sports culture. When I was growing up in Madison, Wisconsin, I was one of four girls on my community soccer team that was sponsored by the local hamburger joint. And going on all the way through high school, I was on a state championship soccer team. My track team was a state champion all four years I was there. I was always immersed in this sports culture that really my mom hadn’t been part of. 

Laine Perfas: You played sports as a kid on co-ed teams. What was that like?

Nordin Beato: I have this one distinct memory. We had played against an all boys team, and there was one, you know, kind of heavyset kid who was a little slower to the ball than I was. And I would steal the ball away from him repeatedly. And feeling pretty good about myself until we line up to shake hands at the end of the game where you go, Good game. Good game. And as I came up to this kid, he just wound up and socked me right in the stomach. And I was so surprised. But I have to tell you, even as an eight year old, I knew that he was hitting me because he was mad that I was a girl and that I had beaten him out on the field. It certainly made me aware that just because I had been given a space to play, I wasn’t necessarily welcome. 

Laine Perfas: In your story, we meet Carol Hutchins, who sounds like a phenomenal person. You said that Carol is kind of intense. When you met her, could you give us an example? Like, what is this woman like? 

Nordin Beato: She’s the kind of person who looks directly in your eyes and won’t work to make you feel at ease until she’s ready to. When I walked into her office, even before I had set up my recording equipment, she looked at me and said, “Oh yeah, I just got off the phone,” and I won’t name it, but it was a major sports publication who had called her to talk to her about Title IX. And she said, “They put women in bathing suits on their cover. Why would they expect me to talk to them?”

Laine Perfas: What was it about her and her life that you felt was appropriate to tell and capture the history of Title IX?

Nordin Beato: She is a big proponent of Title IX, not only with her own life story, but the fact that she wants her student athletes today to understand what Title IX is and what life used to be like before the law’s passing.

Her own personal story is that she just wanted to play sports the way her three brothers were growing up in the 1960s, but just didn’t have access to any organized sports. And at some point, her mother told her it was inappropriate for her to be out on the athletic field. So when Title IX passes, she’s in high school. Suddenly there is a girls varsity basketball team and she’s on it.

So, Carol, she’s going to college at Michigan State University, and playing basketball there, but has an encounter with a visiting coach who basically told her team that “nobody cares about women’s basketball; you have to get off the court.” And that lit a fire in her that hasn’t gone out. To even have a field of their own, practice time, uniforms – none of these things were a given when she first started coaching in the early 80s. She had to mow her own field.

Laine Perfas: Oh, my gosh.

Nordin Beato: They didn’t have a fence yet. They had to put down their own lines. So that’s what started this awakening of them wanting to stand up and ask for what they felt like they rightfully deserved. She would go on to become one of the most decorated softball coaches in sports history in the United States. 

Laine Perfas: And one thing that comes out in your story is that, you know, Carol did amazing work, but it’s really not just about Carol. There are so many women who have done really courageous work through the years. I’m curious how you saw that as you were talking to people about this issue.

Nordin Beato: It’s not natural to stand up and ask for equal treatment under the law, and it takes a group of people inspiring each other to do that.

Carol herself tells a story of … after winning the [College] World Series in 2005 at University of Michigan, the baseball coach – who was younger, less experienced, a shorter resumé – had won regionals. And Michigan offered him a contract that doubled his salary, which now put his salary above Carol’s. And she really … it was a dilemma for her if she should ask for a raise herself, where she had already achieved so much more and had so much more experience. And she had reached out to Nancy Hogshead-Makar, who is a former Olympic swimmer and a legal expert on sports and gender…. And Carol said that Nancy gave her the courage to stand up and ask for her own higher salary. Carol tells a story about putting down her resumé – no name, no gender, no sport – next to the baseball coach’s resume and saying to the administrator, “Who deserves to be paid more?” And the administrator just saying, “Oh, geez.” And she says,” I’m not going to let this go.” And she did get a higher contract in the end. 

And then she pointed to a current example of Dawn Staley, who is University of South Carolina women’s basketball coach who just signed a historic contract deal for $22.4 million for the next seven years. And you look at Dawn Staley’s story, she, in turn, had been inspired by watching a documentary of the women’s national soccer team asking for equal pay. So women are inspiring each other to find the courage and the resilience to stick their necks out, because Carol says she knew plenty of cases where women coaches might start to make demands, or questioned things, and they just simply would get fired. So that there are very high stakes involved. 

Laine Perfas: What gives you hope that Title IX will continue to be a force for achieving gender equity moving forward? 

Nordin Beato: The fact that the law is so simple, but it has really reshaped our society, is kind of astounding when you stop and think about it. Even talking to some of the players on Carol Hutchin’s team at the University of Michigan. They’re just these confident, well-spoken women that, you know that an educational experience that they received on an athletic field has contributed to them just as a person. And that’s going to give them confidence in the work that they’re going to pursue, the public spheres that they’re going to move in, and even in turn, what they’re going to inspire for generations of girls coming up behind them. 

You can see human potential when you create spaces of equal treatment and equal opportunity.

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Collins: And thank you to our listeners. You can find more, including our show notes, with a link to the stories that we discussed in this podcast and to all of Kendra’s work at csmonitor.com/WhyWeWroteThis. This episode was hosted by me, Clay Collins, and produced by Jingnan Peng. Mackenzie Farkus is also a producer on this show. Our sound engineers were Jeff Turton and Alyssa Britton, with original music by Noel Flatt. Produced by The Christian Science Monitor. Copyright 2024.