More than a dozen student affairs associations, nonprofit organizations and victims' advocate groups are releasing an open letter today urging state legislators to reconsider pending bills in several states that the letter says would interfere with colleges' efforts to prevent campus sexual assault.
The letter, written by NASPA: Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education, was sent to lawmakers in all 50 states; in several states, legislatures are considering bills that would require college officials to refer all reports of sexual violence to law enforcement or that would give accused students judicial rights, such as allowing a lawyer to fully participate on their behalf, that are not available to accusers.
"While we applaud these legislatures' desire to assist institutions of higher education in improving their responses to sexual and other forms of gender-based violence that victimize their students, both groups of bills would actually have the opposite effect from the one intended and make it more difficult for campuses to end this violence and its devastating effects on victims' lives," the letter reads.
The mandatory-referring bills could force colleges and universities to be out of compliance with federal law, NASPA stated.
A provision in the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013 amendments to the Clery Act, the law that mandates that colleges track and publicly report instances of certain crimes each year, states that institutions that receive federal funds must inform victims of sexual assault that they can decline to notify law enforcement about being assaulted. Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 also allows certain employees, such as counselors and advocates, to not report incidents of sexual assault.
As recently as last month, the Virginia Senate was considering a bill that would require public colleges to report an alleged campus sexual assault to police within 24 hours. University employees who fail to report an assault to police would have been charged with a misdemeanor. After hearing from survivors and victims' advocates, state legislators are now retooling the plan to promote what one senator calls "enhanced encouragement" instead. Mandatory reporting bills are also being considered in New Jersey and Rhode Island.
Kevin Kruger, president of NASPA, said that turning all sexual assault cases over to law enforcement would make it difficult for victims, without involving the police, to demand that colleges take action about complaints under Title IX. These proposed laws could also discourage some students from reporting the assaults to campus officials, he said.
Read more at Inside Higher Ed: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/02/19/open-letter-calls-legislators-reconsider-campus-sexual-assault-bills