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CyberRays Bjornsrud, Chastain to testify in D.C. on Title IX

April 1, 2003 - Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA)
San Jose CyberRays News Release


SAN JOSE (April 1, 2003) – San Jose CyberRays general manager Marlene Bjornsrud and team captain Brandi Chastain will travel to Washington, D.C., on Monday to testify at a bipartisan hearing in the U.S. House of Representatives on Title IX, the federal law prohibiting gender discrimination in educational programs including sports.

The hearing is sponsored by Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), House minority leader; Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-Calif.), Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), Rep. Nancy Johnson (R-Conn.) and Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.).

Bjornsrud, a former college athletic administrator, recently wrote a guest column for the San Jose Mercury News in which she cited Title IX as fundamental to the creation of women's professional sports leagues, such as the Women's United Soccer Association / WUSA, in which the CyberRays compete, and arguing against changes to the law proposed by the federal Commission on Opportunities in Athletics.

Bjornsrud wrote that the proposed changes are an attempt to gut ``a law that has created even more benefits than its supporters originally envisioned," and that accepting the panel's recommendations "will mean we still believe women are not entitled to opportunity by virtue of their humanity but must depend on the generosity of others for a favor."

The complete article is available online at www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/opinion/5249624.htm.

Chastain's soccer career was one of the beneficiaries of Title IX. She attended the University of California, Berkeley and then Santa Clara University on athletic scholarships available to women as a result of Title IX. She later played for the U.S. Women's National Team when it won the 1991 World Cup in China and the 1999 World Cup in the United States. She also played for the team that won the women's soccer gold medal at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta – the first Olympics in which women's soccer was a medal sport – and a silver medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games in Australia.



Women's United Soccer Association Stories from April 1, 2003


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

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