Under pressure from federal Title IX enforcers, universities have been weakening the procedural protections for accused students who seek a chance to respond to the charges against them. As a result, cases like that of Yale athlete Patrick Witt will become more frequent. [Boston Globe; my Commentary piece a year and a half ago] A contrasting view: Christina Stoneburner.
Posts Tagged ‘Title IX’
Schools roundup
- Oklahoma school district agrees to pay survivors of teen who drove drunk [Tulsa World]
- “The Evidence on Universal Preschool” [David Armor, Cato]
- Things you can hit with a Title IX complaint for doing: fighting academic boycott of Israel [Ben-Atar, Tablet]
- “It may take the fun and spontaneity out of sex, but I don’t care. That’s for the kids to worry about.” [Ron Kuby quoted in WSJ via Hans Bader; earlier on affirmative consent]
- Jason Bedrick on lawsuits against school choice [Cato]
- “The Left/Right Alliance That Legalized Homeschooling” [Jesse Walker, Reason]
- Kid safety mania: “I suggest just keeping children in large jars until they’re 40.” [Amy Alkon]
Schools roundup
- New report: “Schools Cut Back as Litigation Costs Eat into Budgets” [California Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse, PDF] “Swings too dangerous for Washington schools” [AP; Richland, Wash.]
- “Appeals Court Ruling Paves Way for Gender Quotas in High School Sports” [Saving Sports, Ninth Circuit on Title IX] More: Alison Somin [Ollier v. Sweetwater Union School District]
- “College and university administrators demolishing freedom of religion and association” [Bainbridge]
- “Grenade Launchers: The Newest Must-Have School Supply” [Jason Bedrick/Cato, earlier]
- “It was against the school policy for elementary kids to have Chapstick” [Amy Alkon; Augusta County, Va.] “Mom Tells Therapist About Briefly Leaving Kids Alone, Shrink Calls Cops” [Lenore Skenazy]
- Disability and school discipline: “Wondering why a preschooler would ever need to be suspended? Here’s an explanation.” [Amy Rothschild, Greater Greater Washington]
- Civic education needed: some Greendale, Wisc. parents and educators wonder why non-parents are allowed to vote on school matters [Lenore Skenazy]
Title IX vs. men’s school sports
Don’t call it quotas, call it “statistical proportionality” [Christina Hoff Sommers, Time; earlier on Title IX]
“A presumption of guilt in sexual assault cases”
Civil libertarian Wendy Kaminer, writing at WBUR, says the new White House task force report on campus sexual assault
reflects a presumption of guilt in sexual assault cases that practically obliterates the due process rights of the accused. Students leveling accusations of assault are automatically described as “survivors” or “victims” (not alleged victims or complaining witnesses), implying that their accusations are true….
Thus the task force effectively prohibits cross-examination of complaining witnesses. … But by barring cross-examination, you also protect students who are mistaken or lying, and you victimize (even traumatize) students being falsely accused…. School officials are also encouraged to substitute a “single investigator” model for a hearing process, which seems a prescription for injustice.
More links on the current controversy:
- In the Brown University rape-charge scandal, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand has declared that the complaining student was “nearly choked to death” and that her former boyfriend “should be in jail.” His side, as told to Cathy Young, is at the Daily Beast here;
- There are no ambiguities. Or are there? [Sandy Hingston, Philly magazine]
- My Commentary piece last summer on related issues: “Sentence First, Verdict Afterward”
- The feds’ Title IX complaint against Tufts [Terry Hartle, Inside Higher Ed]
- KC Johnson coverage, Minding the Campus: OCR will investigate 55 schools; early reaction to White House report; Occidental has assured students and their parents that the process is committed to fairness; suits by male students at Columbia and Drew; taking issue with a Chronicle of Higher Ed investigation;
- More on the feds’ recent crackdown from Megan McArdle: “Rape on Campus Belongs in the Courts” [Bloomberg View]; the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE)’s response; Hans Bader; Chronicle of Higher Education.
(& welcome Glenn Reynolds/Instapundit readers)
“I think success for us will be seeing an increase”
When is it considered a success to generate more complaints against one’s own organization? When you’re a newly assembled Title IX team, in this case installed at the University of North Carolina following pressure from federal regulators and students. [Harry Painter, Pope Center] Our previous coverage of the Department of Education/Department of Justice “blueprint” on campus harassment and sexual misconduct allegations is here.
Equalizing the boys’ and girls’ athletic fields…
…by tearing down the newly built seating on the boys’ side, provided by voluntary parent contributions. What’s important is that things be equalized, and someone had filed a Title IX complaint. “The seating was also not handicapped accessible.” [Plymouth, Mich.; MyFoxDetroit]
Free speech roundup
- University of Montana professors who refuse Title IX training to be reported to federal government [FIRE, more, Missoulian] Professor yanked from public-university classroom over offensive out-of-class tweet [Popehat, Peter Bonilla/FIRE]
- Preacher/historical fantasist/horrible human being Scott Lively has probably accomplished more actual evil in life than the picketers of the Westboro Baptist Church, yet it raises disturbing First Amendment questions to let him be sued in U.S. court for having urged foreign governments to be more oppressive [NBC News]
- Speaking of wacky preachers, Florida sheriff says Terry Jones arrested for unlawful fuel transport and open gun carry, not because anyone disagreed with his speech [Orlando Sentinel, Volokh]
- Critical speech annoys elected officials and that’s one reason we keep having to fight about campaign regulation [Barton Hinkle, Brad Smith on McCutcheon case, Ilya Shapiro on Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus]
- Minnesota: “Ban on ‘Advis[ing or] Encourag[ing] … Another’ to Commit Suicide Violates First Amendment” [Eugene Volokh] Pennsylvania: “Crime to ‘Disparag[e]’ an Under-18-Year-Old ‘With Intent to Harass’?” [same] Liking Facebook page presumptively protected speech [same] Veto override fails, so Missouri won’t enact proposed ban on publishing names of gun owners or concealed carry permit holders [same, followup]
- Danish-Iranian artist convicted of “racism” after critical comments re: Muslim men [Copenhagen Post via @ClaudiaHajian]
January 9 roundup
- Pittsburgh firm sued in W.V.: “Law Firm Hit With $429,000 Verdict Over Faked Asbestos Suits” [Daniel Fisher]
- “Mashantucket tribal leaders indicted in theft” [Norwich Bulletin; My 2004 take on Connecticut’s pioneering casino tribe]
- New Mexico: “Booster Club Parents Fed up with Regs” [Saving Sports] No, you can’t blame football for Title IX-driven cuts at Mount St. Mary’s [same; University of Maryland Big Ten angle]
- How about this compromise: Gannett publishes where gun owners live, but agrees to do so using Apple Maps.
- On a more serious note, some thoughts on the efficacy of popular gun-control measures in preventing mass shootings [Steve Chapman, Larry Correia, Cato on gun control] “During our negotiations, it wasn’t the NRA that was opposed to putting the names of people receiving anti-psychotic medication into the Instant Check database…it was advocates for the mentally ill.” [Josh Tzuker quoted by Tom Coale]
- “FBI Arrests 26 People for Immigration Fraud; 21 from Law Firms” [Legal Ethics Forum]
- Would anyone notice if we abolished the Cabinet position of Secretary of Commerce? [Ira Stoll]
“Yale’s New Low and the Sad Saga of Wendy Murphy”
If Yale is any example, universities are surrendering without much of a fight to the Obama administration’s demands that they not give overmuch due process to students and faculty charged with sexual misconduct. And why does the press persist in treating as perfectly respectable Wendy Murphy, the oft-refuted roving criminal justice commentator and occasional Title IX complainant? [KC Johnson, Minding the Campus, earlier]