Office for Civil Rights investigating Boise State over scholarship for women in STEM
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights is investigating Boise State University after a complaint that a scholarship for women in certain fields discriminates against students based on sex.
In a letter obtained by the Idaho Statesman, the federal agency said it is proceeding with an investigation, but has not determined the merits of the claim.
The complaint was filed after a scholarship was created at the university specifically for women studying science, technology, engineering, math, medicine or the law — in response to a tenured professor’s public comments that women shouldn’t be recruited into those fields.
The complaint, filed in January, alleged the university was “discriminating against male students, based on sex, by offering the Boise State Women in STEM, Medicine and Law Scholarship, for which only female students are eligible,” according to the OCR letter. The letter was first reported by Idaho Dispatch.
Title IX protects people from sex-based discrimination and applies to education programs and activities that receive federal financial assistance.
Boise State says it has complied with the law
Boise State spokesperson Mike Sharp said the university is not in violation of the law.
“Under federal law, any person may file a complaint with the expectation that it will be taken seriously and investigated,” he said in an email to the Statesman. “Boise State University has complied with the law in all regards relating to the scholarship in question, as this investigation will confirm.”
In a questions-and-answers document from the Office of Civil Rights, the agency said a school generally should not impose a “preference or restriction on the basis of sex” for scholarships, fellowships or other forms of financial assistance.
But there is an exception. Federal law can determine that a “pool-and-match” scholarship doesn’t prioritize a gender if all students can apply to a unified pool of financial aid, and schools assign certain scholarships to applicants.
Schools can administer a scholarship established through a will or trust that requires awards go to a certain sex “so long as the overall effect of the award of such sex-restricted scholarships … does not discriminate on the basis of sex.”
Sharp said the university has had other inquiries on scholarships meant for underrepresented groups of students in certain fields. When reviewing these scholarships, the university met with OCR staff multiple times and “discussed lawful ways to encourage underrepresented individuals to pursue these courses of study,” Sharp said.
Sharp said the university has worked with OCR over the past few years to “develop a scholarship administration policy that complies with” all federal and state laws.
“At Boise State University, scholarship funds are pooled and matched to ensure each fund is awarded in a manner that does not discriminate on the basis of sex, race or other protected characteristic,” he said.
Scholarship created after Yenor’s comments
The scholarship at issue was created after a speech from Scott Yenor, a political science professor at the university, went viral.
In the speech, from Oct. 31, Yenor condemned feminism and called independent women “medicated, meddlesome and quarrelsome,” and referred to universities as the “citadels of our gynecocracy.”
“Every effort must be made not to recruit women into engineering, but rather to recruit and demand more of men who become engineers,” Yenor said. “Ditto for med school, and the law, and every trade.”
Boise State’s student population is 58% women, according to the university. But a breakdown of college enrollment numbers shows women are still a fraction of students in engineering departments. Women make up less than 20% of undergraduate students in the College of Engineering, according to enrollment numbers from fall 2021.
In response to the comments, a Boise State student created a GoFundMe page to start a scholarship for women pursuing STEM careers, medicine and the law. The fundraiser brought in tens of thousands of dollars that were used to create an endowed scholarship at the university, so it will exist indefinitely.
The scholarship, which now has $169,000, was “created to help female students at Boise State feel supported to pursue any degree and career path they choose,” according to the donation page.
According to the U.S. Census, while women’s employment in STEM fields has grown in recent decades — from 8% of STEM workers in 1970 to 27% in 2019 — men still dominate the field. Men made up 52% of all U.S. workers but 73% of all STEM workers, according to census data.
Other complaints filed against Boise State
Mark Perry, a professor emeritus of economics at the University of Michigan-Flint, who filed the complaint, has filed more than 400 complaints alleging Title IX and Title VI violations at universities. Title VI covers discrimination based on race, color or national origin.
He said he decided to start the effort after learning Michigan State University had a women’s study lounge in its student union.
“I realized that that was a physically symbolic and very visible representation of the type of discrimination that goes on all throughout higher education,” he told the Statesman.
Of the more than 200 investigations he said have been opened in response to his complaints, about 135 have been resolved, he said.
In most cases, Perry said, a university has made changes, which could be canceling a program or opening it up to all genders.
Investigations can take anywhere from weeks to years, and that is dependent on several factors, including how cooperative a university is with the OCR, Perry said.
Perry said he has filed other complaints against Boise State in the past. One was on a program called Chickadees, a girl-founded robotics competition team. The team, sponsored by Boise State, was founded in part to “inspire girls to enter STEM fields where they have historically been underrepresented,” according to its website.
In response to the complaint, OCR said the university had provided it with information indicating “that the university has taken various actions to ensure that the team is open to all students regardless of gender,” including adding an inclusivity statement to its website and other documents.
Perry filed another complaint in response to the university hosting the “National Education for Women’s Leadership Idaho.” The federal agency said that complaint was dismissed after the university provided the office with information that showed the program was not restricted to female students and revised its website to clarify the program was open to all undergraduate students “regardless of sex.”
Perry said he plans to continue to file complaints. He’s motivated to continue, he said, out of a sense of “civil rights advocacy” that Title IX and VI should work for everybody. He called it a systemic issue and said he wants to hold universities accountable for their legal obligations under the law.
“I’m still not done,” he said.
This story was originally published March 28, 2022 at 2:23 PM.
