California County to Spend Up to $1M on Title IX Compliance Audits
All K-12 and post-secondary schools, as well as private institutions, will be subject to the new Title IX audits.
Santa Clara County, California – Santa Clara County will spend as much as $1 million to audit its K-12 and higher education Title IX sexual misconduct prevention programs.
The audits are intended to determine if any schools or universities in the county have changed their Title IX sexual misconduct policies in response to the new Title IX rules developed by U.S. Department of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, reports the Daily Post.
The new rules give students who are accused of sexual harassment or other types of sexual misconduct more due process. They also narrow the types of cases that schools and colleges must investigate.
The new million-dollar program is being promoted by Stanford Law Professor Michele Dauber. She successfully campaigned to recall a judge who gave a six-month sentence to former Stanford University student Brock Turner who sexually assaulted an unconscious woman behind a dumpster outside of a fraternity party by two graduate students.
Prosecutors in the case had asked for a six-year prison sentence, and Turner had faced a maximum of 14 years in prison for his convictions of three felony counts of sexual assault.
The new Title IX auditing program was approved by Santa Clara County’s Board of Supervisors. All K-12 and post-secondary schools, as well as private institutions, will be subject to the audits.
“The Trump administration gutted protections in Title IX and increased the likelihood that sexual assaults and harassment will occur, and watered down the responses that administrators at schools and universities should take,” said Supervisor Dave Cortese, reports the Daily Post. “This review is needed now more than ever.”
DeVos’ new Title IX sexual harassment rules went into effect August 14.
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