The National Federation of State High School Associations released the results of its annual participation survey today, listing a record 7,342,910 high school athletes in the 2006-07 school year among its member associations in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. This the 18th straight year the number of participants has increased.

"This is certainly another great report," NFHS executive director Robert F. Kanaby said. "The girls participation figure is particularly exciting since this year is the 35th anniversary of Title IX."

Tennis, swimming and diving, archery, badminton, cheerleading, crew and gymnastics were among sports in which girls outnumbered boys.

Texas remained the leader among the states with 763,967 boys and girls participants, followed by California (735,497), New York (350,349), Illinois (334,358), Michigan (321,400), Ohio (315,473), Pennsylvania (276,911), New Jersey (247,332), Florida (230,312) and Minnesota (220,241).

Hawai'i, ranked 40th in participation numbers, reported 36,763 students participating in sports. Boys who participated totaled 21,200 and girls totaled 15,563.

In 1971, the year before the Title IX legislation mandating gender equity in sports, the NFHS reported almost 3.7 million boys but just more than 290,000 girls competing in high school athletics. The number of girls rose to 817,000 in 1972-73 and, with few exceptions, has continued climbing each year since.

The 2006-07 survey showed a record 3,021,807 girls. The 4,321,103 boys who participated were second only to the record 4,367,442 in 1977-78. The record total of 7,342,910 last year was 54.2 percent of all students enrolled in the NFHS-member schools and an increase of 183,006 from 2005-06, the biggest one-year jump since 1995-96.

Kanaby said the big increase "makes a strong statement that students want these programs."

Soccer and volleyball accounted for the biggest increases in girls participants, with an additional 16,077 and 15,798, respectively, from the previous year. The most popular sport for girls remained basketball, with 456,967, followed by outdoor track and field, volleyball, softball and soccer.

For boys, football again topped the list with more than 1.1 million participants and showed the biggest increase from the previous year with another 32,773 competing. Basketball was second for boys with 556,269, followed by outdoor track and field, baseball and soccer.

"Sometimes there's a real big spike in some new sport," NFHS spokesman Bruce Howard said. "This year, we kind of saw a general increase in a lot of the bigger-participant sports.

"Of course, there's more students in schools. That's the key thing, the ability for schools to continue to fund these programs," Howard said.