Civil Rights Updates

The Office for Civil Rights has a new home! In July, the office moved to Stephens Hall, located in the heart of South Campus across the street from Peirce Hall and attached to Ransom Hall. To find either Samantha Hughes, Civil Rights/Title IX Coordinator, or Kevin Peterson, Civil Rights/Title IX Deputy Coordinator, visitors can use one of the two side doors located on the south side of Stephens, or, from Middle Path, enter through the main doors of Ransom and proceed through the Norton Room.

In addition to a new location, the office was joined by a new staff member, Kirstin Fuller, who fills a dual role as office manager for both human resources and civil rights. Despite being new to this position, Kirstin is not new to Kenyon. Kirstin joined the College in July 2001 working in the Department of Athletics, Fitness, and Recreation. 

Periodically, the Office for Civil Rights shares updates to ensure the community is aware of critical changes to federal law and regulatory guidance, as well as education initiatives and data related to the work we do. You’ll find a few of these highlights described in more detail in the following paragraphs. Any questions should be directed to Samantha Hughes, hughess@kenyon.edu.

Proposed Regulations. On June 23, 2022, the 50th anniversary of Title IX, the U.S. Department of Education released draft regulations to help institutions implement Title IX. The proposed regulations were published in the Federal Register on July 12, which began the 60-day comment period; this comment period ended Sept. 12. The Department of Education is currently reviewing the over 235,000 comments received before finalizing the regulations. After finalizing the regulations, the department will publish them into the Federal Register and indicate the date by which all institutions receiving federal financial funding need to comply. As soon as the final regulations and date of compliance are published, the College’s Office for Civil Rights will incorporate into policy any necessary changes.

Title IX and Pregnancy. On Oct. 4, 2022, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights issued a release reinforcing that Title IX protects students and employees from discrimination on the basis of pregnancy and related conditions. This protection, which includes termination of pregnancy, has been in place since 1975. The full resource is available at this link.

Accessibility Working Group. In 2019-20, after consulting many members of the campus community, Campus Senate developed  a draft statement that articulates Kenyon’s institutional commitment to accessibility and provides a framework for the College’s priorities and actions going forward. Following a necessary pause for the pandemic and a leadership transition in Student Accessibility and Support Services, Acting President Bowman has restarted this work. A working group has been convened and tasked with reviewing and refining the Campus Senate statement, defining and recommending institutional goals and priorities around accessibility, and developing and recommending strategies to measure the implementation and progress toward achieving the defined goals. The working group will complete its work in phases, and will provide regular updates to Senior Staff.

Programming. Initiated by Sexual Wellness Club founder Jesse Leener ’23, several student organizations and College offices are collaborating to bring two sex-ed events to the Hill this fall. The first, “Sex in the Dark,” will take place on Thursday, Oct. 27, at 7:30 p.m. in Rosse Hall. The second, “I ♥️Female Orgasm,” will be held in the same venue on Nov. 10. More details will be shared with the campus community in the coming weeks.

Data. The chart below summarizes the total number of reports, as well as a breakdown of reports by category, made to the Office for Civil Rights for the three academic years of 2019-20 through and including 2021-22. It is important to note that the on-campus population during half of spring 2020, and all of the 2020-21 academic year was smaller due to COVID-19 precautions. Given the small size of our community, we publish data across multiple years to protect the identity of complainants and respondents.

Formal investigations made to the office are detailed in the following table beginning with the 2015-16 academic year and concluding with the 2021-22 academic year.

Higher Education Data Sharing (HEDS) Consortium Survey. The College issued the fourth Campus Climate/Sexual Assault Survey during spring 2022. The 2022 results will be shared with the full campus community before the conclusion of the fall 2022 semester.