Title IX, VAWA and Clery Act Training Best Practices

Vector Solutions (formerly Everfi's Campus Prevention Network) previously wrote an article featured in the current issue of CUPA-HR's The Higher Education Workplace magazine, "Best Practices in Training and Compliance Around Title IX, VAWA and the Clery Act." In the article, we address how higher education campuses can use education, training and ongoing dialog to help prevent sexual violence and change the campus culture towards a safe, respectful environment for every student and employee.

Below you can read the full-text of the article.

Best Practices in Training and Compliance Around Title IX, VAWA and the Clery Act

Violence Against Women Act

The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) has funded the investigation and prosecution of violent crimes against women since 1994. This watershed law created benchmarks at the federal level for what constitutes rape and battery and provided funding for victims' services and violence prevention and training programs. In 2013, the Campus Sexual Violence Elimination (SaVE) Act was added to VAWA as an amendment, clarifying standards for minimum disciplinary procedures and requiring colleges and universities receiving federal funds to provide written rights to students and victims as well as violence recognition and prevention training for students and employees.

In October 2014, the Department of Education published its final regulations for the VAWA amendments, which expanded the categories of violence covered in the Act to include stalking, domestic violence and dating violence; outlined new definitions for acts of sexual aggression; mandated expanded prevention and awareness programs on college campuses; and increased the notifications institutions must provide to the campus community about the institution's responsibility to assist victims, how victims can obtain help, and victims' and alleged perpetrators' rights under the law. The amendments took effect in March 2015.

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972

Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any federally funded education program or activity. What originally began as an "equality in athletics" initiative has greatly evolved over the past four decades. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the principal objective of Title IX is "to avoid the use of federal money to support sex discrimination in education programs and to provide individual citizens effective protection against those practices."

This law applies to traditional educational institutions, such as colleges, universities and elementary and secondary schools. Every institution that receives federal funding is required to have a Title IX investigator/ coordinator on campus.

The Clery Act

The Clery Act was signed into law in 1990, requiring all colleges and universities that participate in federal financial aid programs to keep and disclose information about crime on and near their campuses. The law authorizes certain departments, groups and individual employees as campus security authorities, having a duty to report crimes of which they become aware.

VAWA, Title IX and the Clery Act apply to everyone on a college campus, including faculty, staff and students. By enforcing these laws, universities can drive the culture change that discourages sexual violence. When institutions inform their collegiate communities about the support provided to witnesses and survivors of violent crimes, individuals will be more empowered to report incidents and authorities will be able to bring perpetrators to justice. By encouraging students and faculty to take action and speak up, incidents that may have gone unrecognized previously can be brought to light and addressed immediately.

Training and Dialogue

Given the proper training and plenty of opportunity to engage in meaningful dialogue, employees and students can have a tremendous impact on the effort to eliminate sexual violence on campus. Part of your job as an HR professional is to help your campus stay ahead of the legislation related to campus sexual violence and to help your institution maintain compliance. HR is also often called upon to lead training efforts and facilitate dialogue. So where do you start?

The key components of primary prevention and awareness training programs (which are mandated for all incoming students and new employees) must, by law, include the following:

• A statement explaining that the institution prohibits the crimes of dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking as defined under the Clery Act.
• Clear definitions of dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking and consent in reference to sexual activity in the applicable jurisdiction.
• Procedures victims should follow if a sex offense, domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault or stalking has occurred.
• Specific descriptions of safe and positive options for bystander intervention.
• Available information on risk reduction.

These components are meant to increase awareness among students, staff and faculty of sexual violence, teach them how to identify dangerous situations, lay out best practices for responding and increase their competence in fulfilling any applicable reporting responsibilities.

Training implementation is meant to be a collaborative effort that creates a unified climate change involving each person on campus. An evidence-based, instructional design approach can create real, lasting change among employees and students. So how do you go about designing, implementing and executing a VAWA/Title IX/Clery Act compliance training program? A good place to start is to conduct a needs assessment and campus climate survey to gather data from students on sexual violence and gender bias. If need be, educate or update the president, governing boards and faculty on the laws surrounding the issue.

When designing training, be sure to develop advocates and allies across campus and regularly engage with the people on campus who may be impacted the most by VAWA, Title IX and the Clery Act, including athletic departments, women's centers, resident advisors, etc. Institution-wide understanding and support of the training program will help ensure its successful implementation. This might seem to go without saying, but it's crucial to ensure that your institution's Title IX coordinator (or the person who performs that role as part of his or her other job duties) receives annual training on the issues related to dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking, as well as training on how to conduct an investigation and hearing process that protects the safety of victims and promotes accountability.

Don't think about training as a one-time, check-the-box task. Engaging content, repeated exposure and a consistent message that takes into account different perspectives and speaks to the unique campus community will be most successful. Make sure your training program includes all members of the community - faculty, staff, students and even parents. The laws, regulations, training requirements and best practices are complex, so it may be beneficial to bring in experts to consult with you or help you develop your training.

Also, make sure existing harassment prevention and diversity training supports and does not contradict your VAWA and Title IX training. Consider bringing the training into the classroom itself by encouraging faculty to develop curriculum with training concepts embedded into their courses. This type of consistent messaging can be another way to engage the collegiate community and students to help change campus culture.

Respect the significant decades of work that women's groups have contributed to stamping out sexual violence, but avoid old-fashioned thinking that puts the responsibility for culture change solely on women. Actively engage men and bystanders of all genders and abilities, establish safe zones and reach out to women's centers, student centers and associations to unite the campus in the shared goal.

The student body is a key component to fully implementing a sexual violence prevention training program. Institutions should teach students at the ground level how to be empowered individuals, responsible bystanders and competent responders. Taking courses before and during orientation as well as on an ongoing basis in classes and clinical rotations (when applicable) is a good way to accomplish this. Campuses should encourage students to be advocates for training by educating others and taking what they have learned out into the world.

To best implement an institution-wide training program quickly and efficiently, consider working with a compliance training partner to customize online training for your particular environment. Online training allows the entire campus community to get up-to-date information immediately and ensures that the information can be kept up to date even when laws and rules change.