"One in four women will be sexually assaulted during her college career. Sexual assault and rape effect victims and survivors in a number of detrimental ways. The victims’ and survivors’ academic and social lives are often torn apart, creating a disparity between their lives and the lives of others on campus. Title IX, part of the Education Amendments of 1972, protects women against sex-based discrimination and harassment in academia. Rape and sexual assault are considered extreme forms of harassment under Title IX. The law mandates that schools, including colleges and universities, follow guidelines set by the Office of Civil Rights to prevent and remedy inequities caused by sexual assault. I posit that Occidental College violates Title IX by acting with deliberate indifference in regards to sexual assault and rape. To determine whether my hypothesis is correct, I measured students’ attitudes of sexual assault on campus using a campus-wide blog. I paired the qualitative analysis of the blog with quantitative analysis using a survey of survivors and victims at Occidental. After the analyses, I concluded that Occidental administration violates Title IX through deliberate indifference and because of incomplete compliance with the Dear Colleague Letter by the Office of Civil Rights."

1. Sexual Assault at
Occidental College
Rachel Baer

2.  The presentation discusses sexual assault
and rape. It may contain triggers.
 99% of rapists are men, but not all men
are rapists.

3.  Research methods
 Sexual assault at college
 Oxy data
 Title IX and OCR’s Dear Colleague letter

4.  Literature review
 Content analysis of DearOxy Tumblr
› Measured hope, anger, hurt, disappointment
› Content analysis showed which specific
terms concerned users most
 Oxy survey

5.  Circumstantial information
› School size & student trust
 Emotional/physical effects
› PTSD
 Academic effects
“virtually all victims of rape are affected,
regardless of the circumstances
surrounding the act”(1)

6.  90% of college victims/survivors knew
their assailant before the assault
 Highest probability for assault: first week
of college
 Reminders of the assault/rape abound
(will discuss later as stimuli)

7.  For every additional 10,000 undergrads,
the odds of sexual assault decrease by
HALF
 Oxy has ~2,100 students
 Smaller student body = more trust
› Most assaults occur in “normal” situations
› False sense of security

8.  Underreporting
› Phenomenon in which most victims/survivors
do not report
› Common reasons include:
 Reprisal from assailant or assailant’s friends
 Social isolation
 These reasons are only exacerbated at
small schools (Oxy)

9.  Fears of specific stimuli (experienced by
victims of any/all assault circumstances)
› Being alone, drunk people
› Dead people, suffocation, weapons
 Shows rape is the implicit threat of death
 Fears of situation-specific stimuli
› Location & other aspects of the assault
 Embarrassment, shame, etc.

10.  Almost constant fear from stimuli  PTSD
 PTSD symptoms
› Shame & despair
› Impulsive behavior
› Flashbacks
› Hyper-alert
 At least 43% of college SA/rape victims
have PTSD
› Higher than victims of other violent crimes

11.  Impaired social and work life
 Lower GPA
 Transfer rates same as non-victims
 Common coping technique: avoid perp
› Classes
› Social scene (parties)
› Extra-curricular activities
› Marketplace, Cooler, etc.

12.  Remember the emotional and
academic effects of sexual assault
 Survey aimed to show how these effects
appear at Oxy
 55 survivors completed surveys in 12 days

13. Victim year at time of assault:
Perpetrator year at time of assault:

14. Relationship between Survivor/Victim & Perp.
at the time of the assault
64.7% of friend-rape victims said the assault deeply affected
them and caused them emotional pain
41 out of 49 survey respondents knew the perp. prior to assault

15. “Other” locations include cars, dances, etc.

16.  31% of participants raped at off-campus
houses
 5 occurred at Greek houses
› 3 at SAE
 4 occurred at athletic team houses
› 3 at ATO
 Responses covered past 4 years
› SAE became a dry house during this time

18.  First year
› Highest incident count in Stewie (strong
community)
 Older student
› Highest incident count in Haines, RV (isolated
feel), and Stearns (isolated feel)

19.  6 perpetrators took the victims home to
take care of them
› Violation of trust
 Three year live-on rule increases
concentration of students in dorms
 Lack of bystanders
› RA training does not include SA/rape
prevention or bystander intervention

20.  12.5% feared social consequences
 17% respondents unacknowledged
 DearOxy: “Having watched friends go
through your system, and their rapists walk
away with little or no consequence, I didn’t
feel safe reporting mine.”

21.  Most decisions favored survivor/victim
 All descriptions of process were negative
› “an utter lack of professionalism and
compassion”

22.  High-profile administrators
 Lack of training
› No adjudicator finished all 8 NCHERM trainings
 Zero participants ranked adjudicators as
“competent,” “caring,” “fair,” or “trained and
knowledgeable”

23.  41% felt inadequate when in class and
doing homework
› Only 9 stated their GPAs dropped
› 48% reported no change
 100% involved with 1+ club
 67% reported no change in extra-
curricular activities post assault
 Conclusion: Oxy students are the best
and faculty are supportive.

24.  Of participants assaulted their first year:
› 42.9% reported current anxiety
› 25.7% reported current low self-esteem
› 37.1% reported current distrust
 33 of 55 survivors assaulted their first year
› Only 2 survey participants current first years
› Shows pervasive effects of assault

25. 1. Federal funding
Occidental receives federal funding.
2. Sexual harassment occurred (rape &
sexual assault automatically qualify)
At least 55 cases apply.
3. Appropriate persons knew about the
harassment and did not respond
reasonably
No known investigation of ATO or SAE

26. 4. Institution responded with deliberate
indifference
Continual use of ineffective methods
5. Harassment = “severe, pervasive, and
objectively offensive”
Continual emotional effects of friend/acquaintance rape
6. Concrete, negative effects on
education OR the assault created a
“disparately hostile” educational
environment
9 reported GPA drops AND rapists remaining on campus

27.  Oxy complied with all requirements
except:
› Grievance procedures are not available
throughout campus
› Incomplete NCHERM training
› Specific timeline available only for appeals
process
› “Guaranteed” protection against retaliation
without actual protection
 No system for reporting further problems with
perp.

28.  Legally (S.S. standard): YES
 OCR (Dear Colleague): YES

29.  Bystander training
› Should be required at beginning of each
semester for all students
 POV (etc) training for adjudicators
 Build on the trust that already exists
› Care for each other!