By Dylan Hart
The SG senate has drafted a resolution opposing recent changes to Title IX legislation by the United States Department of Education.
The resolution, which was drafted and sponsored by senator Naya Payne and co-sponsored by nine other senators, says that “under the new policy, schools will likely investigate fewer complaints, and the Department of Education will hold fewer schools accountable for ensuring campuses are free of sexual harassment and assault.”
Title IX is a federal law established in 1972 that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex at federally funded schools. It has had a lasting impact on college sports and how sexual harassment and assault are handled at colleges and universities.
The law recognizes sexual harassment and assault as potential barriers to one’s educational access, and therefore schools can be held legally responsible for ignoring sexual harassment or assault under their supervision.
Proposed changes to the law under Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, who was appointed by President Trump in 2017, were established in November.
Significantly, the changes would adopt the Supreme Court’s standards for sexual harassment, establish rules about the processes of accusation and appeal, allow schools to choose their own standards of evidence, and establish a requirement for schools to allow the accused to cross-examine the accuser.
The Department of Education’s changes to Title IX legislation were made in an effort to give accused students more due process, the department’s website said in a November press release.
But the changes have come under much scrutiny from university administration and student governments throughout the country. A Jan. 31 Stanford Daily article cites as many as 76 college student governments formally opposing the changes.
Payne says that Student Government at the University of Florida contacted him to inform him that a “network” of universities across the country, led by UF, is seeking to pass similar resolutions opposing the department’s changes.
The network consists of several universities in Florida and elsewhere, including Florida Atlantic University, Emory University, Boston College, Kansas State University, Pitzer College and Duke University. UF has reached out to “all major universities, and will be reaching out to more in the coming weeks,” Payne said.
“This network is trying to pass resolutions in as many universities as possible,” Payne said in an email to The Crow’s Nest. “I have gotten USFSP involved in this and have drafted a resolution similar to what is being recommended. I think that it is imperative that the USFSP Senate take lead and join in on this.”
Eventually, UF Student Government plans to take the network’s collective resolutions and present them to DeVos.
SG’s resolution raises many issues with the proposed changes.
It says that the changes would exclude harassment and assault perpetrated off-campus, allow universities to replace investigations with an “unregulated ‘mediation’ process,” allow schools to “only investigate the most extreme forms of harassment and assault,” and “eliminate protections for students studying abroad.”
Additionally, it says that the proposed cross-examination addition would “rehash” trauma caused by harassment and assault. It cites Association of Title IX Administrators President Brett Sokolow, who said that the addition of cross-examination will lead to a “50 percent drop in future reports.”
Payne said that he “followed UF’s model” in drafting the resolution by citing national statistics before moving to USF St. Petersburg statistics on sexual harassment and assault.
These statistics include USF St. Petersburg’s 88.6% rate of students living off-campus and that the University Police Department has reported on “only 8 cases of sexual assault from 2015 to 2017.”
He hopes that USF St. Petersburg’s administration will acknowledge the resolution and stand by it.
“It’s really up to administration what they do with it, but they know where the student body lies,” Payne said.
The resolution passed in a vote at the senate committee on policy March 27 and will be finalized and voted on at SG general assembly April 1. Payne says that he expects the resolution to pass.
“I think this is something everybody should and will get behind,” Payne said. “It’s just common sense in my opinion.”
Read SG’s full resolution here.
