- 2020 Presidential Election Implications
- Spring Climate Survey
- EverFi Spring Training
2:00 p.m. Zoom
Call to order: 2:03 p.m.
- Welcome
- Introductions/Attendance: Alexandra Fulcher, Andrea Boyle, Avanti Puri, Ashley Claiborne, Christopher Arguedas, Isaiah Thomas, Jacalyn Feigelman, James Tranquada, Julie Santos, Junko Anderson, Kim Lundy, Robert Bartlett, Sara Semal, Tirzah Blanche, Vivian Santiago
- 2020 Presidential Election Implications
- From Biden Campaign Website:
Strengthen Title IX and Clery Act enforcement. The Trump Administration has rolled back important protections for student survivors by rescinding the Obama-Biden Administration’s 2011 Title IX guidance. Any backstepping on Title IX is unacceptable. The Biden Administration will restore the Title IX guidance for colleges, including the 2011 Dear Colleague Letter, which outlined for schools how to fairly conduct Title IX proceedings. Biden will also increase fines imposed on colleges for Clery Act violations, or failing to report statistics about campus safety, as well as develop stronger enforcement protocols to oversee reporting under the U.S. Department of Education.
- Repealing the 2020 Department of Education Title IX regulations will take time, as the regulations went through a formal notice and comment process.
- Even if the Department of Education chooses not to “enforce” the regulations, civil liability remains.
- The Title IX Office will be ready to make changes to the Interim Sexual Misconduct Policy if/when the Department of Education rescinds or amends the 2020 regulations.
- Questions/Comments:
- Jim - There should be a campus-wide communication at the beginning of the spring semester.
- Junko - Would any changes be retroactive? Students might wait to report something until after the regulations are gone. Important to think about the date of the report versus the date of the incident.
- Spring Climate Survey
The group discussed the pros and cons of conducting a climate survey in the spring 2021 semester.
- Pros:
- Alex - Get a good feel for areas in need of refreshing for next year, and be able to compare data to previous years. The last survey was two years ago.
- Tirzah - there is a need to know where students are at, but maybe doing the exact same survey wouldn’t be as useful. We need to know where students are at, to know what their experiences have been this year. What kinds of supports and structures to put in place for coming years.
- Cons:
- Alex - Likely low response rate/participation due to Covid.
- Vivian - Impacts on data? Will it guide decision-making? Will the data be reliable?
- Isaiah - What will student’s perception of the data be when it was collected while students were not on campus? Students are over-surveyed this year and there will be fatigue.
- Julie - Students have too much screen time this year.
- Rob - Athletics has struggled with getting student athletes to participate.
- Chris - We should wait a semester. What kind of biographical information collected?
- Jim - Thinking ahead, class of 2024 will have spent first year off campus, most assaults occur in first year. Could impact data for this year and future surveys.
- Isaiah - Fall 2021, brand new first years and sophomores who have never lived on campus. Juniors who have lived on campus for one semester. We need to think of this when conducting training/education in fall 2021.
- Junko - How is this data used? How is it shared with faculty members?
- Sara - How can we relay concerns to faculty and give students a process to share these concerns?
- Vivian - Would guess results were presented to faculty committee meeting, ask perspectives of faculty committee members on how to best use/share results with faculty.
- Chris - There’s a lot of work we can start without a climate survey, shifting the culture - why are queer and trans students of color underreporting to the Title IX Office?
- Rob - this is a good example of the good that can come out of this survey.
- Jim - first survey, percentage of students that did not know if they had been assaulted or not, this has informed subsequent educational efforts.
- Junko - Can we make specific questions? Queer/trans - how many incidents occur within members of the community versus when the perpetrator is not affiliated with Oxy?
- Previous Years Survey Results Available to Review on Shared Drive
- 2020-21 HEDS Survey Questions Available to Review on Shared Drive
- EverFi Spring Training
- Proposed Timing - December 7 - January 5
- Questions/Comments:
- Jim – Suspect the vast majority of students would not complete until the very last minute.
- Vivian - Can we extend the deadline another week? It would give more cushion on the back end.
- Jacie – We should consider the implications of whether students will or will not be on campus.
- Tirzah - Significant communication ahead of time for students would be helpful in increasing completion over winter break.
- Jim – We should talk with Jasmine about putting something up on the College’s Instagram account to encourage completion over winter break.
- Isaiah - Winter break is longer this year, maybe we should capitalize on the extra week.
- Other Business/Questions
- Jim – What are the potential amnesty policy Covid implications?
- Sara - Amnesty stays but require/refer for medical consultation/testing and follow up.
- Be clear on the language in the policy compared with the application to pandemic conditions - any misunderstanding might discourage reporting.
- Include information about the Amnesty Policy in spring semester campus-wide email.
- State Senate Bill 493
- Signed by Governor Newsom on September 29, 2020.
- Does not go into effect until January 1, 2022.
- Some provisions directly conflict with Department of Education’s Title IX regulations, will have to wait and see what the Biden administration does with the Title IX regulations.
- We are already compliant with many of the requirements.
- Next Meeting: December 16 at 1:00 p.m.