Women's Educational Equity Act

The Women's Educational Equity Act Program--administered by the Department of Education--awards grants and contracts to (1) provide educational equity for women; (2) help educational institutions comply with the law's requirements prohibiting sex discrimination in educational institutions receiving federal funds; and (3) provide educational equity for women and girls suffering multiple discrimination due to sex, race, ethnic origin, disability, or age. This report answers the following four questions: What interventions were implemented, by whom, for what audiences, and at what costs, and did these activities continue beyond the grant period? Did these activities hold promise of promoting educational equity for women, and did they reflect the requirements of the legislation? How was information about the interventions disseminated, and what lessons do these activities hold for future efforts to spread information widely in this field? How did changes in administration affect the program's ability to achieve its goals?

GAO found that: (1) the WEEA Program funded 205 general and challenge grants between 1986 and 1991 to promote gender equity in all educational institutions receiving federal funds; (2) the WEEA Program addressed gender equity primarily by providing direct services such as career counseling, remedial academic instruction, and personal support services to girls and women to compensate for past and current inequities; (3) elementary and secondary school students were the most frequently targeted participants, followed by parents and other adults from outside the schools; (4) colleges received 36 percent of WEEA grants, nonprofit or community groups received 32 percent of WEEA grants, and local and state education agencies received 15 percent of WEEA grants; (5) WEEA activities often continued beyond the funding period, but continuation of services was contingent upon the availability of other outside funding; (6) the Clinton Administration requested and received an increase in WEEA funding from $1.98 million to $3.97 million in fiscal year 1995; (7) there was limited information on the effectiveness of past WEEA projects in eliminating sex bias in education because WEEA did not require grantees to produce materials on service activities; and (8) it was not clear whether the Department of Education would make fundamental changes in the design and implementation of the WEEA program.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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