Title IX Coordinators Learning to Cope With 'Dear Colleague' Letter

When the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at the U.S. Department of Education (ED) issued the 19-page “Dear Colleague” letter (DCL) in 2011, educational institutions scrambled to fulfill the new requirements. At the time, surprised campus officials described the letter, which was designed to prevent and address sexual harassment and sexual assault, as repetitive, overwhelming, and difficult to implement.

The DCL reinforced OCR’s long-held requirement that recipients of federal funds designate and publicize a Title IX coordinator. The coordinator must oversee an institution’s compliance efforts by meeting with students who report sexual harassment or assault, ensuring that complaints are handled consistently, and investigating the incident or overseeing the investigation.

Three years later, Title IX coordinators have conquered some elements of the compliance challenge, but subsequent legislation and OCR actions have generated additional questions.

"When someone comes to me with an esoteric question, I would like to be able to say, ‘Here’s the answer,’ and I can’t,” said Amanda Paye, Title IX/ADA coordinator at the University of Washington (UW) in Seattle, “I just have to try to piece it all together. It feels like our agencies are siloed in their focus. We’re not getting as much help as I would like.”

Her most difficult compliance challenge is untangling the web of related legal obligations, she said. For example, she wants more guidance about the intersection of Title IX with the Campus SaVE Act. Also, as a public institution, UW has to ensure due process and First Amendment rights to accusers and the accused, she said. “We want to look at the big picture. We can’t have tunnel vision about Title IX.”

Paye, a lawyer whose position falls within the office of risk management, serves in a compliance consultant role. “There’s no way one person can take every complaint in a university of this size,” she said. UW promotes an “any door” philosophy. Anyone who receives a sexual assault report is obligated to connect the student with the appropriate authorities and resources.

Paye’s program is emphasizing outreach and education to the university community to ensure that anyone who receives a report from a student knows what to do and how to seek assistance. She ensures that the university’s systems of reporting and response are in compliance with Title IX and other relevant laws and policies.

Increased Visibility

Despite its lack of specificity about expectations and requirements, the DCL did vastly increase awareness of Title IX beyond its sports equality mandates, said Jody Shipper, executive director of equity and diversity and Title IX coordinator at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles (USC).

"If I had said to people on this campus in 2009, ‘Hey, I’m your Title IX coordinator,’ they would have replied, ‘Wow. I didn’t know you worked in athletics.’ If I had walked around campus and polled 100 people, either they would have looked at me like ‘What are you talking about?’ or they would have assumed ‘It’s the sports law,’” she said.

“In many ways, the visibility, both nationwide and universitywide, has made our job easier. Now one can say, ‘This really has to happen,’ and it carries more weight. It’s easier to have important conversations,” Shipper said.

Advice From the Field

To help clear up any confusion, Title IX coordinators from United Educators (UE) member campuses offer these suggestions to their counterparts at other institutions:

Spread the word about your process. After establishing a good reporting process, make sure faculty, staff, and students know where to go and what to do. Getting the word out is an ongoing responsibility, said Barbara Martin, Title IX coordinator at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Penn. “I’m always looking for ways to introduce myself to and connect with students and student groups. I want them to think of me as a resource—of course when there’s a reported assault—but also when they are talking about prevention and education. And the training sessions I offer for all employees are a great opportunity to explain my role to that segment of the community.”

Consider a script. Paye finds it helpful during training to provide a script of what to say when students report a sexual assault. This helps avoid unfortunate questions such as, “Are you sure about this?” or “Did you have too much to drink?” During training sessions, “we’re really trying to get to the people students most likely will go to and blurt out their story about this terrible thing that happened to them,” she said.

“We developed an online form that faculty and staff can use to report incidents that are brought to their attention,” Martin said. “We talk about the form in our training sessions. I’m hopeful that doing so in that setting gives employees a level of comfort and confidence when it comes time to react to these emotional and difficult situations in real time.”

Find partners on and off campus. To help spread the word about the DCL’s requirements at the 40,000-student university, Paye is identifying a go-to person in every UW school or college, whether it’s the HR person or associate dean of students. “I’m really trying to build a Title IX and ADA network so I know who to go to,” she said. “You can’t do this alone.” She also advises others to “Reach out to other Title IX coordinators who may be facing similar issues, particularly where they have noticed intersections with state law.”

Shipper agrees, saying, “You can be a great source of support for each other. You’re listening to very difficult information.”

Learn about young people. Get out and talk to students, Shipper said. “People who are older sometimes forget that [sexual] practices that might seem odd to them could be a norm for others, and that shouldn’t bias you.”

Get really comfortable talking about sex. If you can’t, you shouldn’t be conducting interviews.

Use specific language. If your policy indicates that a complainant has a certain number of days for an appeal, state whether those include business days, calendar days, class days, or days during breaks when the institution is closed.

Understand how people in crisis react. Otherwise, you may misinterpret the information being presented. Someone may wait weeks or months to report a sexual assault, and the complainant may behave in an apparently disingenuous manner. For example, the accuser may display no emotions or show heightened emotions. People process incidents in different ways.

UW Develops Sexual Assault Prevention Goals

“This will be the year we collectively resolve to end the chronic and abhorrent problem of sexual assault on college campuses, starting with the UW,” President Michael K. Young said.

Through Young’s statement, the University of Washington in Seattle (UW) is showing national leadership in tackling the problem of sexual assault. A UW task force extensively reviewed the issue and developed a formal report outlining recommended actions. The following are eight key goals identified in the report:

1. Have a visible, robust, easily accessible, collaborative network of response and intervention services for students in need.
2. Educate all students about sexual assault.
3. Create a community that knows how to respond and provide support.
4. Provide an investigation and disciplinary process appropriate for sexual assault.
5. Demonstrate compliance with all applicable federal and state laws, regulations, and guidance.
6. Generate data, metrics, and reporting that allow for sound decision-making.
7. Establish policies and procedures that set direction, clarify intent, and guide coordinated work.
8. Provide effective oversight and follow guiding principles to ensure common direction.