School sports: Boys and girls have the same rights | Letters

I read in your article (“Title IX complaint seeks equality for female sports in Washington schools”) that an official of the Federal Way School District said “Boys participate more in athletics, even though we offer the same amount of sports.”

If anyone wants to look the lie in the face, we need only remember that these are civil rights and each boy and each girl in Federal Way has the same right to participate.

If we look at two years, football (an alleged equal sport for boys) had 762 participants while volleyball, an alleged equal sport for girls, had a total of 158.

Volleyball plays on school nights and football hogs the weekends. Football has a squadron of coaches while volleyball has just barely enough.

I read in your article these four particular complaints “were nothing that was specifically targeting Federal Way.”

Hog spit! Each of these specific complaints had one of the four Federal Way high schools as a target and each had a set of numbers specifically directed at that high school.

It is easy to add material to cover the other eight program components, which is what Terra Solkey tried some years ago and got fired, where the abuse found under “Interests and Abilities” finds even more specific articulations. But why bother until the 330 girls being abused in the allegations in these complaints is addressed?

For that matter, when the district says it is going to survey athletic interest, they may be saying they haven’t done it every three years as required in law.

Simple suggestion: Do the math!

Herb Dempsey, Graham