Gender Equality In Canadian Sport

University athletics and rowing have a long-standing history. While this is particularly true of Great Britain and the United States of America, this essay will focus primarily on the current approaches of the United States and Canada. Both countries offer a variety of varsity sports among their university athletics programs. Rowing is not an incredibly popular sport in either country, especially when compared to the professional sports that are organized and offered at any level. To narrow the scope of this essay, I will examine the difference between the countries as understood by gender-based opportunities in university rowing. This is particularly interesting to study due to the effects of Title IX in the American context. Given
The law was introduced in 1972, but did not immediately come into effect, and there was significant resistance in university athletics due to the changes that were stipulated. Canada is an interesting comparison because it has no such sport-specific, nor university-specific law that targets these cases of gender equality to be resisted against. Another difference between the two countries is the levels of funding available to university athletics. For popular sport, and those which are less-so, the American system has significantly higher budget allocations compared to the Canadian system. The interplay of Title IX and different levels of funding are likely to be the causes of the differences between the
Though perhaps for the wrong reasons, women's rowing has been the recipient of a great deal of financial support.6 Administrators saw the opportunity women's rowing offered them when it came to Title IX testing. The sheer cost of operating a rowing team is large, and to administrators, this is a method with which to offset the costs of more traditional and prestigious male sports. Between equipment, improved – or newly built – facilities, staff, and team size, the operating budget of a rowing team allowed administrators to begin to spend larger sums on a women's sport. The equipment cost and team size are the most significant factors that differentiates rowing from other sports. These two requirements aid athletic programs in passing the tests as required by Title IX. The timing of the rowing renaissance and the movement toward women's rights and Title IX created the perfect opportunity for women's rowing to