ANN ARBOR—”Women and Sports: Lessons from the Playing Field” will be discussed during the University of Michigan’s “Evenings at the Rackham” lecture series at 7 p.m. April 9 in the Rackham Auditorium.

The free, public event will examine the future of women’s involvement in sports and review the strides that have been made since the passage of Title IX, a 1972 federal law that prohibits gender-discrimination in college athletics and other federally funded education programs.

“Women and Sports” will feature a panel discussion by Donna Lopiano, executive director of the Women’s Sports Foundation and member of the National Softball Hall of Fame; Nancy Cantor, dean of the U-M’s Rackham School of Graduate Studies and professor of psychology; Nancy Colasurdo, a Michigan Journalism Fellow and sports writer for the Times of Trenton (N.J.); and U-M alumnus Tearza Johnson, a former All-Big Ten track star.

Elizabeth Hackett of the U-M Women’s Studies Program will moderate. The event is sponsored by the Rackham Graduate School, the Institute for Research on Women and Gender, and the Division of Kinesiology.

“Evenings at the Rackham” is a series of lectures, discussions or performances on wide-ranging topics of scholarly or cultural interest. For more information, contact Vi Benner at