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“Not Alone” – Obama Administration launches initiative to protect students from sexual assault.

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The Obama Administration has released its first report from the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault.

Vice President Biden spoke at 2:30pm Eastern.

Not Alone – Protecting Students from Sexual Assault:

One in five women is sexually assaulted while in college.  Most often, it happens her freshman or sophomore year.  In the great majority of cases, it’s by someone she knows – and also most often, she does not report what happened.  And though fewer, men, too, are victimized.

The Administration is committed to putting an end to this violence. That’s why the President established the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault on January 22, 2014, with a mandate to strengthen federal enforcement efforts and provide schools with additional tools to combat sexual assault on their campuses.

Today, the Task Force is announcing a series of actions to: (1)  identify the scope of the problem on college campuses, (2) help prevent campus sexual assault, (3) help schools respond effectively when a student is assaulted, and (4) improve, and make more transparent, the federal government’s enforcement efforts.  We will continue to pursue additional executive or legislative actions in the future.

These steps build on the Administration’s previous work to combat sexual assault.  The Task Force formulated its recommendations after a 90-day review period during which it heard from thousands of people from across the country — via 27 online and in-person listening sessions and written comments from a wide variety of stakeholders.[…]

Part of that initiative is a new web site: www.NotAlone.gov

“Perhaps most important, we need to keep saying to anyone out there who has ever been assaulted: you are not alone.

We have your back. I’ve got your back.”

President Barack Obama, January 22, 2014

More …

From the White House:

FACT SHEET: Not Alone – Protecting Students from Sexual Assault

(main sections excerpted)


Next Steps

The action steps highlighted in this report are the initial phase of an ongoing plan and commitment to putting an end to this violence on campuses.  We will continue to work toward solutions, clarity, and better coordination. We will review the legal frameworks surrounding sexual assault for possible regulatory or statutory improvements, and seek new resources to enhance enforcement.  Campus law enforcement agencies have special expertise- and they, too, should be tapped to play a more central role.  And we will also consider how our recommendations apply to public elementary and secondary schools – and what more we can do to help there.

Helping Schools Identify the Problem: Climate Surveys

As we know, campus sexual assault is chronically underreported – so victim reports don’t provide a fair measure of the problem.  A campus climate survey, however, can.

Preventing Sexual Assault – and Bringing in the Bystander

The college years are formative for many students.  If we implement effective prevention programs, today’s students will leave college knowing that sexual assault is simply unacceptable. And that, in itself, can create a sea change.

Helping Schools Respond Effectively When A Student is Sexually Assaulted: Confidentiality, Training, Better Investigations, and Community Partnerships

By law, schools that receive federal funds are obliged to protect students from sexual assault.  It is the Task Force’s mission to help schools meet not only the letter, but the spirit, of that obligation.  And that can mean a number of things – from giving a victim a confidential place to turn for advice and support, to providing specialized training for school officials, to effectively investigating and finding out what happened, to sanctioning the perpetrator, to doing everything we can to help a survivor recover.

Improving and Making More Transparent Federal Enforcement Efforts

To better address sexual assault at our nation’s schools, the federal government needs to both strengthen our enforcement efforts and increase coordination among responsible agencies.  Importantly, we also need to improve communication with survivors, parents, school administrators, faculty, and the public, by making our efforts more transparent.


Categories: Uncategorized.

/ 12 Comments

12 comments

  2. fogiv

    This can’t be true.  Betty Pinson @ GOS has been telling me that Obama hates women since before he was elected.

    (great news JanF, thanks for putting this up — I hadn’t heard about this).

  4. JanF

    The College Sexual Assault Crisis Turns A Corner

    “Today’s recommendations are a critical step in addressing the needs of campus survivors,” Lindy Aldrich, the deputy director for the Victim Rights Law Center, a nonprofit that’s dedicated to serving sexual assault survivors, said in a statement. “We know there is a long road ahead of us, but today sends an important message that change is necessary to ensure all students can access an education free from sexual violence.”

    However, the White House’s recommendations are in sharp juxtaposition with the news coverage of this issue over the past week. The report comes on the heels of sexual assault controversies that recently came to a boiling point at four prominent universities – the latest installment in a long line of public failures that have sparked protests at colleges across the country.[…]

    But now that campus sexual assault is an issue that’s gained federal attention, it’s clear that it’s not contained to a small handful of bad actors. The White House’s task force is setting the stage for universities to get in front of the news cycle by taking a proactive approach.

    “Colleges taking a stand on it won’t be saying ‘we have a problem’ – rather, they’ll be one of many voices, coming from the federal government down, saying that we want to do this better,” Daniel Rappaport, the sexual assault prevention coordinator at American University, said. “It gives them a unified opportunity to avoid that bad press and really frame this in a positive way.”

    ~

    Campus Sexual Assaults Are Targeted In New White House Report

    The recommendations stem from three months’ work by the task force that was formed earlier this year, in response to widespread dissatisfaction with the way college campuses handle cases of sexual assault. A unique February conference on the issue hosted by the University of Virginia was by college presidents and others.

    “We know that too many universities are still discouraging survivors from filing complaints,” said the Department of Education’s Catherine Lhamon, who attended the session. “They are still delaying investigations for months, or longer. They are still retaliating against students for speaking out about their assaults.”

  5. JanF

    U.S. Department of Education Releases List of Higher Education Institutions with Open Title IX Sexual Violence Investigations

    The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) released today a list of the higher education institutions under investigation for possible violations of federal law over the handling of sexual violence and harassment complaints.

    Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in all education programs or activities that receive federal financial assistance. In the past, Department officials confirmed individual Title IX investigations at institutions, but today’s list is the first comprehensive look at which campuses are under review by OCR for possible violations of the law’s requirements around sexual violence.

    “We are making this list available in an effort to bring more transparency to our enforcement work and to foster better public awareness of civil rights,” Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Catherine E. Lhamon said. “We hope this increased transparency will spur community dialogue about this important issue. 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.”

    One of the schools on the list is Florida State University which had the botched rape investigation that “cleared” their Heisman Trophy winning quarterback. I hope more light is shed on that travesty.

  6. JanF

    The president’s initiative should help. University administrators won’t be able to deny there is a problem when people are encouraged to report the assaults without being harassed. It is like the Catholic church hiding the sexual predator priests because the victims were afraid to come forward.

    Campus Rape Reports Are Up, And Assaults Aren’t The Only Reason

    The number of “forcible rapes” that get reported at four-year colleges increased 49 percent between 2008 and 2012. That’s the finding of an analysis by NPR’s Investigative Unit of data from the Department of Education.

    That increase shows that sexual assault is a persistent and ugly problem on college campuses. But there’s also a way to look at the rise in reports and see something positive: It means more students are willing to come forward and report this underreported crime.

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