## Facts

- Donna Hoover, a 16-year-old eleventh-grade student at Golden High School in Colorado, sought to play interscholastic soccer.
- Golden High School had a varsity boys’ soccer team; Hoover participated in conditioning, skills drills, and junior varsity games as the only female player.
- Hoover was in excellent physical condition and did not suffer any disabling injury, though she was once stunned in a collision with a larger player.
- School officials removed Hoover from the team after determining her participation violated Colorado High School Activities Association (CHSAA) Rule XXI, § 3, which limited interscholastic soccer to males.
- CHSAA justified the male-only rule on asserted medical and safety concerns based on general physiological differences between boys and girls.
- Hoover filed a Rule 23(b)(2) class action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 on behalf of similarly situated girls statewide, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief; defendants conceded state action and did not contest class prerequisites.

## Issues

1. Whether CHSAA Rule XXI, § 3, categorically excluding girls from interscholastic soccer, denied equal protection by denying female students equal educational opportunity in athletics.
2. Whether generalized, sex-based safety rationales and asserted physiological differences are sufficient to justify a blanket exclusion of girls from soccer.
3. What form of relief is appropriate if the exclusion violates equal protection, including whether equal opportunity may be provided through integrated teams or genuinely equal separate programs.

## Decision

- The court held CHSAA Rule XXI, § 3 unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause.
- The court found that excluding girls from interscholastic soccer denied female students equal educational opportunity.
- The court rejected the asserted safety justification as insufficient to support a categorical sex-based ban.
- The court permanently enjoined enforcement of the rule and required the provision of equal soccer opportunity for girls, either through integrated participation or genuinely equal separate programs.

## Legal Principles

- Sex-based classifications affecting access to public school athletics are subject to heightened equal protection review requiring a strong fit between the classification and the asserted governmental interest.
- Student safety may be an important interest, but it does not justify broad, categorical exclusions based on generalizations about sex.
- Blanket exclusion of girls from a sport is constitutionally suspect when safety concerns could be addressed through sex-neutral criteria (e.g., size, skill, medical condition) applied equally to all students.
- Equal protection requires equal athletic opportunity; it may be satisfied by integrated teams or separate teams only if separate programs are genuinely equal in opportunity and support.

## Conclusion

The court invalidated a statewide rule restricting high school soccer to boys, holding that generalized safety claims and sex-based assumptions could not justify denying girls equal access to an educational athletic program; it ordered statewide injunctive relief requiring equal soccer opportunities for female students.


Hoover v. Meiklejohn, 430 F. Supp. 164 (D. Colo. 1977)