Giving Compass' Take:

• A report published by the New York University Journal of Legislation and Public Policy revealed that there have been more Title IX lawsuits in which state courts support institutions, and have impacted how administrators handle sexual assault cases. 

• The author reports that the judiciary system needs to intervene because colleges are not always equipped to handle these situations. How can colleges mitigate these challenges with donor support?

• Read about the changes in Title IX policies that changed sexual assault investigations in 2018.

The number of students who have sued colleges and universities for potentially botching sexual violence cases has exploded in recent years, according to a new analysis.

The report, published recently in the New York University Journal of Legislation and Public Policy, shows that federal and state courts have sided with institutions across the U.S. a little less than half the time in cases that yielded "substantive decisions." The legal landscape around Title IX may be shifting more as the U.S. Department of Education prepares to release its regulations around the federal sex discrimination law.

For the last several years, backlash has intensified over guidance the Obama-era Education Department released in 2011 dictating how colleges and universities should adjudicate sexual assault and harassment cases.

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos revoked the Obama-era guidance in 2017, eventually replacing it with draft regulations that would carry the force of law and would provide more protections for accused students. The regulations also potentially lessen the number of cases colleges would need to investigate and force officials in campus Title IX hearings to allow cross-examination between the parties.

While the regulations will provide uniform expectations on Title IX for all colleges and universities that accept federal funding, court actions have significantly affected how administrators handle sexual assault cases, said Samantha Harris, a co-author of the report and vice president for procedural advocacy at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), a civil liberties watchdog in higher ed.

Based on the analysis by Harris and KC Johnson, a history professor at Brooklyn College who tracks Title IX litigation, about 298 lawsuits have yielded "substantive decisions" as of mid-August 2019. Of those decisions, courts have sided with colleges in 134 cases and ruled in favor of plaintiffs 151 times. Decisions in 11 cases were either neutral or mixed, and two rulings were sealed and not made public, according to the report.

Read the full article about increase in Title IX lawsuits by Jeremy Bauer-Wolf at Education Dive.