Cohen v. Brown University

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Cohen v. Brown University
Court	United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit
Decided	November 21, 1996 (1996-11-21)
Citation(s)	101 F.3d 155

The case of Cohen v. Brown University challenged cost-cutting efforts Brown University made in 1991 that targeted women's sports and women's interest in sports. Women's volleyball and gymnastics teams were demoted from university-funded varsity status to donor-funded club varsity status, along with the men's water polo and golf teams. Even though both men's and women's teams were moved down to donor-funded teams, the plaintiffs in this case allege that this action maintained Brown's history of discriminatory treatments of women in their intercollegiate athletics program and as such was violating Title IX legislation.^[1]

Title IX Overview[edit]

Title IX is a federal civil rights law that prohibits discrimination based on sex in educational programs.^[2] All education programs ranging from elementary to college levels that receive federal funding are included in this law, and as such can face consequences should they violate it. Passed with the Education Amendments of 1972, the 37 words that make up Title IX set a precedent that has paved the way for the setup and success of future civil rights movements based in gender and other types of discrimination.

Case Timeline[edit]

1991[edit]

• Brown University eliminates the four athletic teams

1992[edit]

• April: Amy Cohen and other affected female athletes file a class action lawsuit against the university.
• May: Defense files a motion to dismiss the case.
• July: Plaintiffs file a motion for preliminary injunction.
• August: Defense's motion to dismiss is denied by the court.
• October: Bench hearing held by Judge Pettine on the matter of the preliminary injunction.
• December 22: Preliminary injunction granted by the court.
• December 29: Brown files an appeal and the appellate court grants a stay on the injunction.

1993[edit]

• April: The First Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the District Court's decision on granting the preliminary injunction.

1994[edit]

• September: Trial on the merits begins.
• December: Partial settlement agreement is reached between the parties

1995[edit]

• March: Court opinion and order issued found that Brown University was in violation of Title IX and it failed to provide equal treatment to all athletes.
• April: Brown appeals the court's ruling
• May: District Court orders a modified order that required Brown to submit a plan of compliance within 60 days
• August: Brown ordered to elevate several women's sports to university-funded status.
• September: Final judgment of the court entered and Brown's motion for additional findings is denied. Brown appeals the decision
• November: Appellate court found no error in the district court's findings and application of laws. The appellate court did find error in the district court's award of relief and referred it back to the district court for reconsideration.

1997[edit]

• April: Brown submits a new compliance plan to the district court

1998[edit]

• June: Parties reach settlement agreement on outstanding issues and it is approved by the court
• October: Court enters judgment in favor of the plaintiffs
• December: Plaintiffs submit fee application seeking attorney's fees. Brown contests the fees.

2001[edit]

• December: New judge grants attorney fees

2003[edit]

• Judge grants addition funding for the fees incurred by the plaintiffs during the fee contest. Brown appeals, and settles.

Issues[edit]

This case involved issues stemming from a change in the classifications of women's sports teams, discriminatory funding practices on the part of Brown University, and sex-based discrimination in athletics.^[3] The questions this case, and its subsequent appeals, sought to answer were: are Title IX regulations being interpreted in a way that upholds the law and contributes to equitable athletic opportunities for men and women, and are the practices being used at Brown University a violation of federal Title IX laws?

Facts of the Case[edit]

In 1991, Brown University announced that four varsity athletics teams, two men's and two women's, would be moved from university-funded to donor-funded teams. Following this announcement, gymnast Amy Cohen and twelve other Brown female student-athletes filed a class-action lawsuit against Brown University in 1992. Decided in 1995 by Senior District Court Judge Raymond James Pettine, this case alleged that Brown University was partaking in gender-based discrimination in its budgeting of men and women's sports. According to the plaintiffs, Amy Cohen et al., the Brown University athletic department disproportionately allocated federal funds to men's sports over women's sports despite women making up forty-eight percent of Brown's total enrollment population. Even though women made up forty-eight percent of enrollment numbers, they only received thirty-seven percent of athletic opportunities.^[4] The argument of the defense was that the athletic funds were allocated in such a way that reflected the interests of those interested in being athletes. In other words, they used reverse discrimination as their defense; the women did not have the same interest in sports as men did so the athletic department did not need to fund women's teams in the same manner by which they fund men's teams. The defendants, Brown University, Vartan Gregorian, and David Roach, state that because men are more interested in sports, the funding for their sports should be prioritized.

The plaintiffs in this case moved for a preliminary injunction that would immediately reinstate the effected women's athletics teams that were demoted to donor-funded status and prohibit the university from eliminating or demoting any other women's athletics teams.^[5] The injunctive relief was granted and the court's intervention required Brown University of reinstate the previously demoted women's teams back to university-funded and prohibited the further elimination or reduction of all other existing women's varsity teams.^[5] This injunction was upheld indefinitely in the 1995 decision by Judge Pettine.^[1] During Brown's appeal, this preliminary injunction was initially put on hold before being reinstated following a decision from an appellate level court.

Brown lost its first appeal when the appellate court upheld the ruling the district court had handed down regarding the preliminary injunction.^[3] Following the affirmation of the preliminary injunction, the trial began. After two and a half months of trial hearings, the involved parties reached a partial settlement agreement. This settlement agreement largely ignored the inequity of Brown's athletic department's treatment of female athletes.^[3] Instead, it acknowledged funding disparities between men's and women's university-funded teams. In acknowledging this, the defense also acknowledged the inequality of opportunities surrounding participation in university-funded athletics.^[3] The findings and opinions that came out of the conclusion of this trial were that Brown University had in fact violated Title IX policies through failure to recognize and accommodate the interests of female athletes, failure to create increase opportunities for women, failing to provide equal treatment to all athletes, and failing to fix parts of the athletic department that ultimately led to these failures.^[3] Following this decision, Brown was given a period of 120 days to draft a comprehensive plan that would bring their athletic department into compliance with Title IX.^[3] That time period was later cut down to 60 days and Brown ultimately failed to provide a comprehensive plan to the court. This led to the ordering of several women's sports- women's gymnastics, women's water polo, women's skiing, and women's fencing- all to university-funded status. Final judgment on this case denied Brown's motions for additional fact finding and amendment to the previous judgment. Brown again appealed.

The appellate court found no errors in the factual findings of the lower court and its interpretation and usage of laws that helped determine the violation of Title IX in its case. The appellate court did however find error with the specific relief outlined by the lower court and therefore remanded it back to the district court judge for reconsideration. The following year, Brown submitted a proposal for a new comprehensive compliance plan that proposed increasing women's intercollegiate athletic opportunities and eliminating men's positions, not entire men's teams, in order for it to be economically feasible for the university. The proposal had to comply with the court's order that athletic participation opportunities be proportionate to the university's enrollment. This settlement was agreed to and contained various miscellaneous provisions.

The court entered judgement in favor of the plaintiffs in this case and opened the opportunity for them to submit their fee application. The plaintiffs submitted a fee application, which was contested by Brown University, and the defense was ordered to pay over $1 million in attorney's fees and costs, as well as an extra $250,000 for the fees incurred during their contest of the fees. Brown originally challenges that order as well, but ultimately settled.

Decision[edit]

Cohen v. Brown University was officially decided in 1996 with the ruling appellate judge siding with the plaintiffs;^[6] Brown University had violated Title IX regulations by cutting university funding for the women's gymnastics and volleyball teams. Brown tried again in 2020 to eliminate multiple university-funded athletic teams and was met with additional lawsuits that stemmed from the original 1992 Cohen v. Brown University case.

Importance[edit]

This case set a precedent when it came to equal opportunities in the intercollegiate athletic community. This landmark case set the foundation for how universities around the United States should be creating and maintaining equal athletic and academic opportunities for male and female athletes. Since its implementation, Title IX has led to the elimination of dozens of male collegiate athletic teams in order to create equal opportunities for their female counterparts. In doing so, the world of athletics has risen to an entirely new level. From intercollegiate athletics to the Olympics, there has never been a larger female presence on the stage. Establishing and upholding Title IX protections has created nearly unlimited opportunities for young female athletes to not only chase academic and athletic careers, but to be seen and supported while doing so.

References[edit]