Define Title IX

• Definition

• Final Rule

Title IX training

• Introduce Campus SaVE

• Clery training requirements

  • Requires “recognition” i.e. introduce the concept of literacy—students are unable to recognize problematic scenarios when they arise

• Title IX posting requirements

  • Key Elements

• Both of the above require that the student be trained or notified at least once

School accountability is largely voluntary

• Title IX “jurisdiction” is complicated

• Title IX accountability reporting by recipient is voluntary

• Clery accountability reports are mandatory

• Clery jurisdiction is significantly smaller

  • School and official school-affiliated locations

    • Many schools do not even guarantee 4 years of housing

  • SCU dissociated completely from its fraternity and sorority system, yet still, today, “with six Fraternities and five Sororities, more than twenty-five percent of Santa Clara students are involved in Greek life.”

    • Greek life is the de facto social scene at SCU. This means SCU relies on the Greek system to attract students. They want to have their cake and eat it too.

    • Serious fraternity-related assault is occurring. Wrt these events, the administration took a “my word versus yours” position. They claimed incidents were not happening because reports were not being made.

      • Another article, Reddit, Reddit2, Reddit3, “If you like drinking all day, being a dick, getting hazed, and trying to force girls to fornicate, scu greek life is for you.”

    • The dissociation means Greek life at SCU is not under Clery jurisdiction

    • It is moot because reporting culture is said to be “poor” at SCU

      • A story (I did not ask to publish formally and do not plan to) from a current student—one fraternity at SCU has a policy for handling assault internally. Where they ask girls to list assault in an “accountability book” so they can hold brothers accountable themselves, with the worst repercussions being expulsion from the frat; no school or police involvement whatsoever. This was apparently the idea of the new frat president after the previous frat president was expelled from the frat for assault.

      • There are no means for proving this from online sources. I can only quote a website saying “people don’t report at SCU”

    • They do not have mandatory Title IX training annually. They do not have a Title IX accountability report to indicate efforts at transparency or concern for student safety and well-being

    • They have zero Title IX cases pending with OCR, last 2 resolution letters are from 2017 and 2018 (Title II and Title VI/IX)

Students are not reporting in general

• Sexual assault is still pervasive

• From 2015 to 2019 students have a better understanding of what constitutes assault (AAU survey—SaVE training is working)

• But students are not reporting

  • AAU survey shows about 1/3 of students report incidents

  • AAU survey only shows a slight improvement in reporting awareness

  • UCUES shows mediocre reporting awareness

  • SCU policy site says Title IX is learned by word of mouth

  • There are barriers to reporting

    • “Reflexive” Title IX Coordinator awareness can reduce other barriers (opinion?)

    • A posting requirement wrt Title IX Coordinators may be insufficient

      • Posting does not mean literacy. There is no mandate for Title IX Coordinator awareness in training. There is nothing to stop the Title IX Coordinator info from being buried in legal documents and school policy.

A single training and notification session is not sufficient

• AAU survey shows students are less likely to report after their freshman year

• Elements like the “forgetting curve” or misalignment with “learning styles” can affect comprehension and information retention

• There is an undue burden on the student to expect them to learn the entire training in one session, and to expect them to identify important information like the Title IX Coordinator in the first session

• Personally I know one who is rushing can come out of the training having learned basically nothing

  • I am not at risk

  • I clicked through things as fast as I could and didn’t read much

  • The jargon, like “Title IX” at first exposure is alienating and foreign. It can represent a barrier to learning.

• One must be an interested party in order to take the training seriously

  • A friend has experienced assault

  • The person themselves has come close to or experienced some degree of assault themselves

  • The student has heard rumors about SVSH issues occurring at some social event

• Therefor, one training session is not sufficient

  • Most schools do not require annual training, e.g. UCLA is the only UC campus to require annual undergraduate training

  • A student may not be an interested party until after the first training session

    • If they are trained only once, then they are not equipped to recognize SVSH and they are not equipped to report it

Background Title IX

• History relevant SVSH

  • The evolution of more granular regulations over time is moot if an ever more perfect system is effectively “out of reach” of the students. Annual training is the necessary connection between the students and this system.

• History relevant Title VI

  • Proactive approaches: direct amendments and regulatory updates

Define Title VI

• Definition

• Differences historically between Title IX and Title VI

  • Despite differences historically with Title IX, Congressional Research Service says, “much of the doctrine under the statute has been shaped by its use in the public schools.”

• Years amended (the law is still extremely vague, despite its de facto purpose)

• Differences in enforcement vs. Title IX

  • Still largely relies on agency guidance via Dear Colleague Letters

    • Agency guidance is exactly that, guidance

  • Reactive not proactive

    • Case law is not comprehensive enough (the latest UCLA lawsuit is an example)

    • OCR is comprehensive, but they are over-burdened, behind, and issues persist even with involvement

• Non-existent reporting loop

  • Notification need only be “made available”

  • Optional training (freshman orientation)

  • Based on both of the above, how will students know when to report if they don’t properly understand their rights?

  • As a result, there is no way to know how pervasive some Title VI issues are (Reddit example)

  • A working loop requires publication of notification-literacy-know who to report to (“coordinator awareness”)-trust the reporting system

Title VI has a demonstrated need for

• notification

• publication of notification

• coordinator

• at least one mandatory training scenario

  • safety

  • de-escalation

  • bystander intervention

  • hostile environment discrimination

  • bias—both institutional and organizational

  • time, place, manner

  • reporting

Title IX still has a similar need for academic and on-campus training scenarios

• There is a gap with respect to on-campus issues that are covered by Title IX

  • 2020 amendments included a definition of sexual harassment

  • AAU definition of sexual harassment

  • How pervasive is sexual harassment?

    • Check UCLA annual Accountability

    • GW Annual Title IX

    • AAU Survey

• Not enough coverage, and not covered in appropriate context

  • Sexual harassment training is voluntary(?)

  • Undue burden

  • Training is “out of place with SV, IPV, and stalking”

  • It is confusing to mix social scenarios with academic scenarios, this does not promote professionalism in the classroom