Photo by Tingey Injury Law Firm on Unsplash
By Maria Marton
Title IX celebrated its 50th anniversary on June 23. The resource comes from Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 and requires the university to generate a safe environment by assisting with sexual discrimination, sexual exploitation, nonconsensual sexual contact, gender discrimination, etc. The on-campus celebration took place Tuesday, Sept. 27, on Degenstein Lawn.
Through a conversation with the Director of Title IX Compliance, Christiana Paradis, she explained how Title IX was originally seen as regarding sexual harassment only in 1997 with a guidance from the Department of Education. It was not until 2011, with the Dear Colleague Letter, that it started addressing situations of sexual harassment. Title IX predominantly focused on assisting students who experienced teen pregnancy and, in the past, would have been kicked out of school. It assisted equality in sports teams regardless of gender, and admissions to the university regardless of gender. “We are seeing for the first time just how bad the problem truly is with sexual misconduct,” said Paradis.
Still, even though the problem of sexual misconduct recently started being addressed, it is safe to say that Title IX, in the past decade, has succeeded in enhancing awareness towards sexual misconduct. There has been a lot more reporting than in the past, people are more conscientious of “red flags” and unhealthy relationships, students know the resources available to them and know where to look for help.
Paradis also explains how interpersonal violence is a community issue: “it emerges because we live in a society that produces violence,” she said.
Title IX is a student driven process. It follows what the survivor is looking for and what they believe will be the best course of action. There are cases where the student that reports only wants information about healing resources and emotional support, without looking to file a process against the aggressor. In fact, about 70% of reporters do not move forward with a process.
There are formal processes and informal processes. The informal brings more control to the hands of the student and how they want to proceed. Some will make clear how they want the school to act towards the aggressor, for example, making them aware of what they did and how it impacted them so the incident does not repeat itself. This process of addressing the aggressor comes in the form of impact statements or communication regarding boundaries and consent.
“Consent is not something that you just practice before you are having sex with someone — before you are engaging in any type of sexual activity with someone — but something you are really checking in throughout the way and also afterwards. It is an ongoing thing, not a one-time thing,” says Paradis.
Informal processes create the opportunity to develop this awareness, for people who are open to assuming accountability and would like to hear what was reported. This is an efficient path towards reducing violence:
“How we stop that [violence] and how we stop hurting other people is by recognizing the impact of that, apologizing, taking accountability, learning and vowing to do better,” says Paradis.
It is important to understand that Title IX is a very political and partisan resource, so its regulations are vastly affected by the political processes. For that reason, there isn’t much to be modified or improved upon when it comes to formal processes, which are controlled by the Department of Education. So, the informal process is the part of Title IX that Paradis really hopes to develop more, since it provides more space for changes. It can be brought up as more robust and even hold additional educational opportunities for people who want to be more aware.
Other improvements that are looking to be made in Title IX are making the Outreach Letters in the beginning of the year as inviting as possible, so students feel more supported and connected. One problem is that most of the students don’t engage with the letters, so thinking about how to still protect them and make sure their education is not impacted is also something the Director looks forward to addressing in the future.
Paradis talked about the most gratifying part of running Title IX. She said it is very fulfilling to be able to meet students and helping them reach outcomes that they want to get to.
“Sometimes I have a first intake meeting with a student, and where they are at that first intake meeting versus where they are at the end of an informal process can be very different,” says Paradis. “It is really fantastic if we can see a student come out on the other side and feel like the process was meaningful for them.”
When it comes to the mission established in the beginning, it is safe to say that Title IX has come a long way. The impact can be seen when looking at the statistics of the number of women now completing college degrees compared to the 1970s.
“Women were drastically underrepresented in education and now they earn most of the degrees being conferred,” Paradis said. “Women can now major in STEM and men can now major in nursing and education. That wasn’t possible prior to Title IX.”
Title IX is starting in a new direction, but not away from the original mission. It is expanding to new borders where reproductive justice, for example, is going to be the next frontier of the resource. Also, it is going to provide further protection to transgender and non-binary students, since the most recent regulations go further into providing protections towards sexual identity.
“A lot of it is going to hinge on what happens in the next presidential election, so if there is one thing I would like us to take away is how important it is to vote,” says Paradis.