The new federal list of 55 colleges and universities with open “sexual violence investigations” includes some of the biggest names in higher education and a few from the Washington region.
The list, released Thursday, continues the federal push to shine a spotlight on campus sex assaults in response to questions raised in recent years about how prominent colleges have handled rape allegations and related issues. This week, a White House task force released a report aiming to help colleges prevent sex assaults.
But the new list does not include details about exactly what the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights is examining at each school. The law at issue, known as Title IX, prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender at schools that receive federal funding.
“We hope this increased transparency will spur community dialogue about this important issue,” said Catherine E. Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights. “I also want to make it clear that a college or university’s appearance on this list and being the subject of a Title IX investigation in no way indicates at this stage that the college or university is violating or has violated the law.”
Catholic University of America was the lone D.C. institution on the list.
“The University was informed by the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights on January 8, 2014, that a Catholic University student had filed a Title IX complaint,” said university spokesman Victor Nakas in an e-mailed statement. “The complaint concerned the investigation and adjudication of a report of sexual assault that occurred in December 2012.
“The University has cooperated fully with the Department of Education to provide all of the information that the department has requested in a timely manner. It will continue to do so and is confident that there will be a just resolution of this matter.
Also on the list were the College of William and Mary and the University of Virginia.
“We have received notification about a complaint made to the Office [for] Civil Rights and we are working with them to provide the information they requested,” William and Mary spokesman Brian Whitson said. “The Family Education Rights and Privacy Act prohibits me from discussing the details of the specific case that led to this, but in general, I can tell you sexual assault response and education is an area we are very focused on.
“We continually look at our own practices to determine if they can be improved or enhanced. Since this is a broad review of our policies and practices by OCR, the result may well provide us valuable information as we continue to look at new ways to address an issue that confronts every university in the country.”
A message left with a U-Va. spokesman was not immediately returned. Among Maryland schools, Frostburg State University landed on the list. A spokeswoman for that university was not immediately available.
Ada Meloy, general counsel of the American Council on Education, which represents colleges and universities, said the release of a comprehensive list of schools under investigation appeared to be a first. She echoed the department’s caution about interpreting the list, saying it basically signified “what the level of their workload is in this area at the moment.”
Meloy added: “Institutions for some time now have been paying more and more attention to this issue. That’s certainly going to continue.”
Here is the list of schools under open investigation as of May 1:
•Arizona State University
•Butte-Glen Community College District
•Occidental College
•University of California at Berkeley
•University of Southern California
•Regis University
•University of Colorado at Boulder
•University of Colorado at Denver
•University of Denver
•University of Connecticut
•Catholic University of America
•Florida State University
•Emory University
•University of Hawaii at Manoa
•University of Idaho
•Knox College
•University of Chicago
•Indiana University-Bloomington
•Vincennes University
•Amherst College
•Boston University
•Emerson College
•Harvard College
•Harvard University Law School
•University of Massachusetts at Amherst
•Frostburg State University
•Michigan State University
•University of Michigan at Ann Arbor
•Guilford College
•University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
•Minot State University
•Dartmouth College
•Princeton University
•CUNY Hunter College
•Hobart and William Smith Colleges
•Sarah Lawrence College
•SUNY at Binghamton
•Denison University
•Ohio State University
•Wittenberg University
•Oklahoma State University
•Carnegie Mellon University
•Franklin and Marshall College
•Pennsylvania State University
•Swarthmore College
•Temple University
•Vanderbilt University
•Southern Methodist University
•The University of Texas Pan-American
•College of William and Mary
•University of Virginia
•Washington State University
•University of Wisconsin at Whitewater
•Bethany College
•West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine
Source: Top Stories - Google News - http://ift.tt/1i2jny0
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