San Jose State announced its compliance with the new Title IX regulations pertaining to criteria and procedure of how complaints will be investigated in a campuswide email Friday.
The move is mandated by the U.S. Department of Education and SJSU must comply to avoid losing federal funding.
Title IX is part of the Education Amendments of 1972, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex at any federally funded institution. Its purpose is to avoid the use of federal funds to promote sex discrimination and provide better protection, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
All 23 California State University campuses would have lost funding if they failed to comply by August 14, Kathleen Wong(Lau), SJSU’s chief diversity officer, stated in the email.
“SJSU is firmly committed to responding to and addressing sexual harassment and sexual misconduct that affects the CSU community,” Wong(Lau) stated in the email.
Wong(Lau) said when the Title IX Office receives a formal complaint, Addendum B: Federal Mandated Hearing Addendum, will first be applied to see if the case meets the criteria set forth. If it doesn’t, then the case will be investigated under CSU Executive Orders 1096, 1097 or Addendum A which have broader qualifications for misconduct.
Complaints under Addendum B require the incident to have occurred in the U.S., within a recognized program or activity part of the university or on property with university interest.
Scope of Investigation
One of the key changes highlighted in the new addendum is the scope of the investigation.
The Title IX coordinator can further review misconduct allegations that don’t fall under Addendum B, meaning anything that does not fall under the Addendum A criteria, that come up in investigation as well as provide resolution through Addendum B or other CSU policies.
Under Addendum B, live hearings will be done via videoconferencing, unless otherwise appropriate, and each party will be given 10 minutes of opening remarks, but no closing remarks.
According to Addendum B, each party must have a hearing advisor present for questioning purposes of other parties.
A hearing advisor, which may be the same as the support advisor, is responsible for questioning the opposing party and witnesses during the hearing.
If either the complainant or respondent don’t have a hearing advisor, a trained one will be provided to them by CSU, Wong(Lau) said.
During the meeting, the hearing officer may begin by asking the witnesses and parties questions. A summary statement could also be presented by the Title IX coordinator or the investigator, according to Addendum B.
Questions could be submitted for review of relevancy as determined by the hearing officer before the hearing, as well as during the hearing the officer must deem a question relevant before it could be answered and there can be no objections.
Questions should be asked in a respectful manner and if they are not, the questions need to be reframed.
Addendum B requires that the hearing officer not base their decision solely on what others say at the hearing unless that person testifies, nor can the hearing officer form their decision from a person’s lack of answering questions.
Appeal process
Another key amendment to Title IX is the appeal process included in Addendum B, which must be filed in writing 10 business days after the decision letter.
A decision letter will be emailed to the respondent and complainant by the university president after the hearing officer presents their recommendations. The letter will include the outcome of the investigation, a redacted copy of the hearing officer’s report and steps to appeal to the Chancellor’s office.
In order to appeal, the written statement must show lack of evidence, procedural irregularities, conflict of interest, abuse of discretion or new evidence.
CSU Executive Orders and Addendum A
Wong(Lau) stated in the email that if it’s determined the complaint doesn’t meet Addendum B guidelines, it will be reviewed under CSU’s single-investigator model under Executive Orders 1096 or 1097, which is the CSU’s way of reviewing student misconduct cases.
Should the allegations not meet Addendum B, or EO 1096 or 1097 criteria, it will be evaluated under Addendum A.
Addendum A, EO 1096 and EO 1997 all have broader criteria for suspected violations involving any student, staff or faculty, even if the incident happened at a non-SJSU location and outside the U.S.
Wong(Lau) said the universities can address misconduct through their individual campus policies and state’s regulations, adding that California law and CSU policies provide more coverage than federal statutes.
Moreover, Wong(Lau) said while there are some new changes, employees are still required to report possible sexual misconduct, sexual harassment, stalking and domestic violence to the Title IX office, unless otherwise exempt by CSU policy.
“Regardless of which process, or whether a case meets criteria for an investigation, our Title IX team continues to provide supportive measures and other services,” Wong(Lau) said.