Here's How You Can Stop Betsy DeVos's Terrible New Campus Sexual Assault Rules
A little over two weeks ago, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos announced a new set of proposed rules about how colleges handle sexual misconduct allegations. Let’s just say they will change a lot of things for victims. In case you don’t want to read all 149 pages, Alyssa Milano is here to give you TL;DR version-in rhyme. While sitting next to a Christmas tree.
In a video shared exclusively with Cosmopolitan, actor and activist Milano describes why DeVos’s new rules are "#OneShiXttyGift” to college students (the video was produced by It’s On Us, the campus sexual assault organization founded by Vice President Joe Biden in 2014). Milano explains that DeVos’s gift can be sent back... if enough people voice their opinions online during the government’s mandatory public comment period, which ends January 28, 2019.
Here are a few of DeVos's proposed rule changes that Milano mentions:
The definition of sexual harassment will be very narrow.
Under the previous Obama guidelines, it was defined as “unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature.” DeVos wants to change it to “unwelcome conduct on the basis of sex that is so severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive that it effectively denies a person equal access to…[an] education program or activity.” Tracey Vitchers, the Executive Director of It’s On Us, says that this is “an incredibly high standard that goes counter to almost all definitions that have existed in schools, but also that exist in workplaces.”
“By the time someone’s being denied equal access to their education,” she adds, “it’s gone too far. It should never reach that point.”
Schools can ignore incidents that happen outside of school-sponsored programs.
Experience a sexual assault at an off-campus party? Your college will now be free to do nothing. Meaning your only recourse will be to go to police (which only 20 percent of female college students do, according to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, or RAINN). “We know that 87 percent of college students live off-campus,” says Vitchers. “And this will disproportionately affect students at community colleges, which don’t have housing.”
Live cross-examination will now be required.
Currently, schools have flexibility in how they handle investigations. Some require victims and alleged assaulters to submit answers to written questions, says Vitchers. But if DeVos gets her way, all schools will be forced to stage hearings in which representatives for both students confront and cross-examine each other (Vitchers says that the survivor could technically be on Skype in the next room). This process has the potential to retraumatize victims. What's more, “these new rules don’t prohibit the accused students’ dad or fraternity brother from coming in and cross-examining the survivor,” says Vitchers.
The good news is that the government is required to review and respond to all comments submitted by the public for 60 days before putting these proposed changes into effect. To write a comment that will get their attention, check out It’s On Us’s handy guide (unfortunately, form letters aren't as effective). “So go ahead put one more thing on your list of holiday tasks,” says Milano, in the video. “Take Betsy’s shitty gift and shove it up her-"
Cheers!
If you’ve experienced sexual assault and need crisis support, please call National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673) or visit their 24/7 chat here.
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