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Upon completion of my Masters degree in Student Development and Leadership in Higher Education I hope to promote to the next step in my career ladder as an assistant department administrator and eventually a department administrator at the University of Houston.

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In 2012 former President Obama passed the Differed Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy (Who are the dreamers, n.d.). The policy was created to assist undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States at a young age. Those under the DACA policy were given a social security number, permission to work in the U.S., driverse license, and differed deportation. In 2017 President Tump receded the policy and delayed it until March 2018. Each year 5 to 10 percent of DACA recipients enroll in college (Who are the dreamers, n.d.).

Who are the dreamers. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.acenet.edu/Pages/Protect-Dreamers-Higher-Education-Coalition.aspx

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protect dreamers higher education coalition

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Protect Dreamers Higher Education Coalition

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Protect Dreamers Higher Education Coalition

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Approximately half a million students received a Perkins loan in 2017. The Perkins loan program provided low interest loans for students who had financial need. The loan allowed for those in careers such as law enforcement, teaching, and military members to receive loan forgiveness after a certain number of years. Institutions have been held responsible to cover the cost of the debt cancelled (ACE, 2018).

ACE and the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators are currently seeking that the Department of Education reimburse institutions for the debt cancelled (ACE, 2018).

ACE, NASFAA ask education department to reimburse institutions for Perkins Loan forgiveness costs. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.acenet.edu/news-room/Pages/ACE-NASFAA-Ask-Education-Department-to-Reimburse-Institutions-for-Perkins-Loan-Forgiveness-Costs.aspx

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​The Perkins Loan Program, which expired in September 2017, provided low-interest loans for students with financial need and was funded through a partnership between the federal government and participating higher education institutions.

Nearly half a million students received a Perkins loan in the last year the program was offered. These students-and others who received a Perkins loan in the past-can qualify to have their debt fully or partially cancelled, provided they work in certain public service fields such as teaching, law enforcement, or military service.

However, for the past eight years, the burden of covering the cost of these cancellations has fallen solely to colleges and universities with no assistance from the Department of Education (ED), despite a statutory requirement to do so.

ACE and the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA) sent a letter in July to Secretary Betsy DeVos about ED's obligation to reimburse cancellation costs to eligible institutions. The associations followed up last week with a letter​ to Under Secretary Diane Auer Jones, outlining their concerns and requesting ED meet its obligations to reimburse institutions, which is required under federal law.

While the department's reason for failing to make the required payments has been a lack of funds appropriated by Congress, it has consistently acknowledged that it has an obligation to do so, the associations said. In the meantime, some institutions have already spent more than $3 million of their own money meeting the federal requirement to cancel Perkins Loans.

"Federal case law, recent Congressional action and Department of Education statements all make clear that this is an issue that needs to be addressed immediately," the groups wrote. "The matter is increasingly urgent as the department has announced that it will release guidance on the return of Perkins Loan funds in December of this year. We strongly believe that this matter needs clarification before that occurs."

ACE and NASFAA are urging the department to, at a minimum, delay requiring institutions participating in the Perkins Program to return these funds to the Department until the issue of the unreimbursed cancellation costs is resolved.

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ACE, NASFAA Ask Education Department to Reimburse Institutions for Perkins Loan Forgiveness Costs

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​The Perkins Loan Program, which expired in September 2017, provided low-interest loans for students with financial need and was funded through a partnership between the federal government and participating higher education institutions. Nearly half a million students received a Perkins loan in the last year the program was offered.

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Exploration Option 2 - National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA)

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Exploration Option 2 - National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA)

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Harvard University has been under scrutiny recently because the universities admissions policy allegedly discriminates against Asian-Americans (Fernandes, 2018).

The institution aims at creating a diverse environment. Data gathered from the group Students for Fair Admissions is stating that the campus is putting a cap on how many Asian-Americans are accepted each year. University officials will have to go to trail and defend their current admissions procedures (Fernandes, 2018).

This case can impact how universities use affirmative action to limit race-conscious admissions policies.

Fernandez, D. (2018). The Harvard admissions trial starts today. Here is what you need to know. Retrieved from https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2018/10/15/the-harvard-admissions-trial-starts-today-here-what-you-need-know/gqTtsjGdDEjnuIkmBeiyIM/story.html

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The latest front in the battle over affirmative action opens Monday in federal district court in Boston with a case alleging that Harvard University's admissions process discriminates against Asian-American applicants.

The lawsuit, brought by Students for Fair Admissions, a group representing Asian-American applicants, relies on six years of admissions data from Harvard and is likely to reveal closely-guarded secrets about how students get into one of the most competitive colleges in the world.

Students for Fair Admissions alleges that Harvard's race-conscious admissions process, which puts a priority on having a diverse campus, discriminates against Asian-American applicants and caps how many of them it admits every year.

While this case is about Harvard, an institution that enrolls only about 1,600 freshmen from a pool of more than 42,000 applicants every year, it is being closely watched because it could offer opponents of affirmative action an opportunity to limit race-conscious admissions in higher education more broadly.

The trial is likely to put some of Harvard's most senior administrators on the stand to defend its policies.

Harvard students, alumni, and employees marched in support of affirmative action in admissions while opponents rallied against it.

Here's a rundown of the major players in this case and what to expect in the coming few weeks.

Harvard administrators. William Fitzsimmons, the university's dean of admissions; Drew Faust, its president until this past June; and Rakesh Khurana, dean of Harvard College, are all expected to take the stand. Fitzsimmons, known as "Fitz," has outlasted several Harvard presidents and has overseen the college's admissions process for more than 30 years. He will be the first to testify.

Edward Blum. The conservative activist and leader of Students for Fair Admissions is either a tireless advocate for race-blind admissions, or an opportunist looking to undo decades of civil rights legislation by recruiting Asian-Americans to his cause, depending on which side of the issue you stand. Blum, who unsuccessfully challenged affirmative action in the recent University of Texas case involving a white student, will not testify in the Harvard trial. But he will likely be a daily presence in the courtroom.

The students. Students for Fair Admissions doesn't plan to call any students who have been rejected by Harvard to testify. But the judge has allowed Harvard students who support affirmative action to testify about their experiences in admissions and diversity at the college.

The experts. The nuts and bolts of the case hinge on the analysis of dueling economists who use different methodologies to come to conflicting conclusions about whether the university discriminates against Asian-Americans. Harvard's expert, David Card, from the University of California, Berkeley, found no evidence of discrimination. Peter Arcidiacono, a professor at Duke University who examined the data for Students for Fair Admissions, concluded that Asian-American students were disadvantaged by Harvard's process. Both will testify in the case.

The judge. Allison Dale Burroughs is a former prosecutor who was nominated to federal district court in 2014 by President Obama. In January 2017, she blocked an executive order issued by President Trump meant to bar entry to the United States for refugees and immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Earlier this year she warned Harvard, which has been reluctant to release its admissions data in open court, to be careful about unnecessarily redacting huge amounts of information.

The trial is expected to last about three weeks. It is unclear how long Burroughs will take to make her ruling. Ultimately the case is expected to land at the US Supreme Court.

Deirdre Fernandes can be reached at deirdre.fernandes@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @fernandesglobe.

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The Harvard admissions trial starts today. Here's what you need to know - The Boston Globe

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The latest front in the battle over affirmative action opens Monday in federal district court in Boston with a case alleging that Harvard University's admissions process discriminates against Asian-American applicants.

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This article was found in the Porter Henderson Library. The researchers gather data in order to identify college students awareness to their own sexual assault, barriers to reporting, the use of drugs and alcohol in sexual assaults. The method used to conduct the research was mixed methods.

Schwarz, J., Gibson, S., & Lewis-Arévalo, C. (2017). Sexual assault on college campuses: substance use, victim status awareness, and barriers to reporting. Building Healthy Academic Communities Journal, 1(2), 45-60 https://doi-org.easydb.angelo.edu/10.18061/bhac.v1i2.5520

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In recent years sororities and fraternities have made a bad reputation for themselves. Institutions have been working hard on how to make Greek life safer for students. Pennsylvania became the 45th state to implement an Anti-Hazing law. In 2017 Timothy Piazza died after excessively drinking during a fraternity pledge. Students who participate in these events may face fines, expulsion from the university, and withholding diplomas.

Paterson, J. (2018). Pennsylvania becomes 45th state with anti-hazing law. Retrieved from https://www.educationdive.com/news/pennsylvania-becomes-45th-state-with-an-anti-hazing-law/540334/

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Dive Brief:

Pennsylvania on Friday became the 45th U.S. state with anti-hazing laws on the books when Governor Tom Wolf signed into law a bill requiring secondary and post-secondary institutions to have anti-hazing and reporting policies and procedures in place, CNN reported.

The Timothy J. Piazza Anti Hazing Law is named for a Penn State University student who died in 2017 as a result of injuries sustained from falls after drinking excessively at a fraternity pledge event. The law strengthens penalties that could include fines, withholding diplomas and expulsion.

The law also adds a felony charge for aggravated hazing if serious injury or death result, making the state one of 12 to do so. Since 2005, there have been more than 77 deaths related to fraternity activities nationwide.

Dive Insight:

There also has been some movement apart from legal remedies to reform behavior at fraternity events.

The Piazza family is among the parents of hazing victims who are working together on the issue. The families of 16 students who died in fraternity hazing incidents gathered in February to provide each other support and initiate a national anti-hazing campaign that began this fall.

In addition, presidents of the three universities where deaths occurred last year are collaborating to make Greek life safer, including through the creation of a national scorecard to evaluate conduct among these groups. They discussed the scorecard concept in April at a conference on the topic that brought together leaders from 31 colleges and universities.

The presidents agree on the viability of Greek life on campus, but realized many college leaders need guidance on how to improve issues such as behavior, accountability and communication, the Chronicle of Higher Education reported.

At least two organizations specifically address the issue in higher education. HazingPrevention.org is a nonprofit tracking state legislation on hazing that provides a variety of related resources, including an interactive map showing what states have hazing laws. Stop Hazing Now offers data about incidents and trends and provides educational material.

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Pennsylvania becomes 45th state with an anti-hazing law

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Pennsylvania on Friday became the 45th U.S. state with anti-hazing laws on the books when Governor Tom Wolf signed into law a bill requiring secondary and post-secondary institutions to have anti-hazing and reporting policies and procedures in place, CNN reported. The Timothy J.

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The article discusses recents comments made by President Trump regarding sexual assaults. The article includes leaked information from the Title IX draft that is going to be released.

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President Donald Trump on Tuesday bemoaned "a very scary time for young men in America" following allegations of sexual assault against his Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

The comments earned Trump sharp rebukes from advocates for sexual assault survivors.

Speaking to reporters at the White House, Trump said, "My whole life I've heard you're innocent until proven guilty, but now you're guilty until proven innocent -- that is a very difficult standard."

"This is a very difficult time. What's happening here has much more to do than even the appointment of a Supreme Court justice," Trump said.

The Trump administration has long railed against what it perceives as a lack of due process in campus sexual assault investigations. U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos last year withdrew guidance from 2011 surrounding Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, the federal gender antidiscrimination law protecting against sexual violence. DeVos said the Obama-era rules had been unfairly slanted against accused students.

While activists have credited the Title IX rules with bolstering protections for survivors, colleges and universities in some cases have apparently been too zealous in their interpretations, resulting in a number of accused students winning lawsuits and having their sentences reversed over the past several years.

New Title IX regulations are expected from the department soon. A leaked draft of the document shows that the regulations would boost the rights of the accused and drastically reduce the number of federal sexual misconduct probes.

Advocacy groups for survivors criticized Trump's remarks in interviews with Inside Higher Ed.

"I think it's not a scary time for men who have not committed sexual assault," said Carly Mee, interim executive director of SurvJustice. "Maybe it's a scary for men who might be held accountable, but this notion that people are now guilty until proven innocent is just not true."

Mee added, "It really comes down to the fact that men who have engaged in improper misconduct are concerned that they can't get away with that. My answer is that if [they] treat women with respect and aren't committing sexual misconduct, they have nothing to worry about. If someone is worried, I would wonder why they're so worried."

In his remarks, Trump was conflating the process surrounding criminal charges with what is essentially a job interview for Kavanaugh -- "a significant job promotion" to the Supreme Court, Mee said. She likened this to the difference between campus sexual assault adjudication and court trials: one process determines whether a student should be kept on campus, while the other decides whether someone will be sentenced to jail time and lose his or her freedom entirely.

And survivors still must prove they were raped, Me said. The burden of proof falls to them.

Rates of false sexual assault reports are quite low, reportedly between 2 and 8 percent, a fact that belies the administration's rhetoric, said Laura Dunn, a lawyer with the Washington-based firm the Fierberg National Law Group.

"The reality that is sexual harassment, misconduct and violence are prevalent with historical discrimination against women, resulting in low prosecution rates for these crimes," Dunn said in an email. "Furthermore, there is a long history of institutional cover-ups to avoid civil liability and administrative obligations to survivors. Think of the Catholic Church, Michigan State, Penn State, etc. We have so many scandals because survivors are not believed. Trump is furthering a misinformation campaign that contributes to disbelieving survivors specifically, and women more generally, when they sound the alarm about sexual misconduct."

Alyssa Peterson, a state organizer with the activist group Know Your IX called it "unconscionable" that the Education Department is pushing the rollback of protections for survivors despite the Me Too movement and the continued national reckoning around sexual assault issues, noting that Trump too has been publicly accused of sexual misconduct by at least 15 women.

"It just shows how out of touch they are," Peterson said.

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Trump bemoans that men are now 'guilty until proven innocent'

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President Donald Trump on Tuesday bemoaned "a very scary time for young men in America" following allegations of sexual assault against his Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. The comments earned Trump sharp rebukes from advocates for sexual assault survivors.

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Graduate student assistants across campuses are seeking a wage increase to $15 hour. Students believe that a salary increase would help them cover living and academic expenses.

Although institutions label graduate students as part-time, many students consider themselves full-time. Students are expected to provide assistance, teach, and conduct research.

Flaherty, C. (2018). Graduate students' fight for $15. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/10/26/graduate-student-assistants-campuses-across-us-are-pushing-15-hour-what-they-call

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Amazon announced this month that it would begin paying its workers at least $15 per hour, making it the latest employer to cede to labor activists who have been pushing for that new minimum wage nationally for several years.

Graduate assistants want $15 per hour, too, and are waging their own campus campaigns for it.

"Fifteen dollars an hour represents a living wage in much of the U.S.," said Casey Williams, a Ph.D. candidate in literature at Duke University. "Grad workers, like all workers, deserve to earn enough to live decently in exchange for the research and teaching labor they provide universities, many of which depend on the work of grad students and adjunct professors to function, maintain prestige, secure key grants and attract tuition-paying undergraduates."

Graduate students pushing for $15 per hour generally maintain that they are full-time, full-year employees, even if universities view them as part-time employees or as students learning to teach and do research. Fifteen dollars per hour times 40 hours per week, times 52 weeks per year, is $31,200. So $31,000 -- which is on the high end of graduate student stipends nationally -- has emerged as a new target minimum annual stipend.

Emory University recently announced that it had upped its minimum graduate assistant stipend to about $31,000, from about $24,000 -- a 29 percent increase. The official university notice said the change was part of a bigger academic excellence initiative. But graduate students have attributed it in part to their on-campus advocacy for $15 per hour.

Isaac Horwedel, a Ph.D. candidate in theology at Emory, said in a statement that the pay increase means "the difference between making rent or not for me and many of my fellow workers, and is a step in the right direction toward improving working conditions on campus."

Service Employees International Union, among other organized labor groups, has supported low-wage workers in the Fight for $15 campaign, on college and university campuses and off, including at Emory. At Duke, SEIU withdrew its petition for unionization before the results of a 2017 graduate student union election could be certified -- a sign of unclear support for unionization or imminent defeat. But some graduate students are still seeking wage increases and better working conditions outside of collective bargaining.

That's increasingly true across private campuses without recognized unions in the Trump era, since the future of a major Obama-era National Labor Relations Board decision in favor graduate student unions at these kinds of institutions looks grim. (State governments determine whether graduate students on public campuses are employees entitled to collective bargaining, and not just students.)

A spokesperson for Duke noted the union election outcome and said that most graduate students gets stipends of about $29,000 to $31,000 per year. SEIU's accounting says grad students on campus tend to make closer to $20,000 to $25,000. The university doubled down on its numbers when asked about the discrepancy. Williams offered up his own example, saying he has a $22,470 base salary and no guaranteed summer fellowship this year.

Horwedel said he and his colleagues hope that Emory will "expand living wages" to all campus workers. Following a long tradition of student solidarity with campus workers on pay and other matters, $15-per-hour campaigns at numerous institutions have included lower-wage employees. Duke said last year that it would up its minimum wage for eligible full-time employees to $15 per year by next summer. The current minimum is $14 per hour.

Williams said that work in general in the U.S. "has become increasingly precarious and flexible." Graduate students, in particular, can no longer count on "finding a decent-paying tenure-track position upon graduating, and so can't afford to make financial sacrifices -- or go into debt -- during grad school," he added. And establishing a "living minimum wage" is one way to ensure workers can continue to take care of themselves, their families and their work.

Joseph Verardo, vice president and chief operating officer of the National Association of Graduate and Professional Students, said that efforts toward a $15 minimum hourly rate for graduate students will benefit their quality of life and increase their productivity. Such efforts should keep all graduate students in mind -- not just graduate assistants with stipends, he said, noting that many master's and unfunded Ph.D. students work graduate-level jobs on campus for actual hourly wages, not stipends.

Nationally, stipends for funded students range from about $13,000 to $34,000, depending on the program, institution and location, Verardo said, emphasizing that $15 per hour is a target minimum, not necessarily a target.

Even on the high end of the stipend range, it's "difficult to live on a $30,000 salary and cover living and academic-related expenses," such as books and fees, he said. Of course, that's "even more difficult when annual earnings are in the teens."

Graduate workers at Illinois State University, who make about $14,000 per year on average, recently voted to form a union affiliated with SEIU. Macauley Allen, a graduate student in music, said he supported unionization because he was tired of "scrounging" for food money.

Graduate assistants at Loyola University in Chicago, where there is also an active $15-per-hour campaign, get a base stipend of $18,000, which a university spokesperson said is equivalent to $2,000 per month for nine months.

Again, graduate students involved in the campaign tend to consider themselves full-year employees, since their research -- which they say is part of their job, not just their training -- doesn't stop. But most universities fund assistants for the academic year, when they're engaged in the more obvious work of an assistant, such as teaching. And many institutions say they see graduate students as trainees, not workers.

Lacy Endicott, a graduate assistant in art history at Washington University in St. Louis, said her and her colleagues' labor "extends outside our assistantship responsibilities." They positions require "pedagogical training, mindful preparation of course materials and departmental service, in addition to completing our own research. Would a tenured professor's continued pedagogical training and personal research be considered outside of their regular work responsibilities? No."

Graduate stipends also are supposed to cover living expenses, she said, noting that graduate students are often discouraged from seeking additional work that could distract them from their programs. That's even if they need extra money to live.

Earlier this month, graduate workers at Wash U participated in a Fight for $15 rally on campus, with personal stories and chants such as, "What's outrageous? Poverty wages." Graduate student organizers report that the average annual stipend there is about $22,000.

Julie Flory, university spokesperson, declined to share the average annual stipend but noted via email that graduate students in the College of Arts and Sciences voted down an SEIU-affiliated union bid last year. Since that time, she said, "we have continued to partner and engage with our students about ways to improve their educational experience through direct conversation and by working with graduate student councils, departments and faculty to identify opportunities to enhance graduate education and support."

As always, Flory added, "we are committed to providing the best environment for all of our students to succeed."

Travis Dauwalter, a Ph.D. student in candidate in public policy at Duke and president of its Graduate and Professional Student Council, said his colleagues who are pushing for a $15 per hour wage appear to be doing so "thoughtfully and always with an eye toward collecting more data." Let's understand "the full scope of this issue and how it interplays with all the other things that a Duke student is facing, like rising housing costs, food insecurity, feeling a sense of community and finding a great job."

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Graduate student assistants at campuses across the U.S. are pushing for $15 per hour, what they call a minimum living wage

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Amazon announced this month that it would begin paying its workers at least $15 per hour, making it the latest employer to cede to labor activists who have been pushing for that new minimum wage nationally for several years. Graduate assistants want $15 per hour, too, and are waging their own campus campaigns for it.

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In recent months I have heard a lot in the news about victims of sexual assault opening up and discussing their experiences. Many times victims will not report the incident because they are embraced of what happened or are unaware of what is sexual assault. Title IX was passed in 1972, it prohibits sex discrimination in any institution or program that receives federal funding. This includes sexual assault and sexual harassment. It is the schools responsibility to investigate cases and protect its students (Know your rights, n.d.).

Approximately one-in-four women are sexually assaulted while in college. Social norms impact the views students have on sexual assault. Forty percent of college students believe it is the the victims fault if they were intoxicated. Many students are not aware of what constitutes as being sexually assaulted (Schwarz, Gibson, & Lewis-Arévalo, 2017).

Know your rights sexual harassment and sexual assault under Title IX. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.aauw.org/what-we-do/legal-resources/know-your-rights-on-campus/campus-sexual-assault/

Schwarz, J., Gibson, S., & Lewis-Arévalo, C. (2017). Sexual assault on college campuses: substance use, victim status awareness, and barriers to reporting. Building Healthy Academic Communities Journal, 1(2), 45-60 https://doi-org.easydb.angelo.edu/10.18061/bhac.v1i2.5520

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Exploration Option 2 - National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA)

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Exploration Option 2 - National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA)

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Title IX has been a hot topic in higher education recently. The case between Dr. Blasey-Ford and Mr. Kavanaugh had gotten a lot of attention from students, faculty, and staff. Program such as Culture of Respect are now in many campuses training faculty and staff how to respond to sexual assault. The program also educates students on what to do and how to prevent sexual assaults.

Dunlap, J. (2018). The Kavanaugh effect on campus. Retrieved from https://www.naspa.org/about/blog/the-kavanaugh-effect-on-campus

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The hearings for Supreme Court Justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh brought feverish attention late last week across the country and internationally, even for those who don't typically follow politics. The hearings included testimony by Dr. Christine Blasey-Ford, who bravely testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about being sexually assaulted in high school, an assault which Kavanaugh has been accused of committing. Attention to the hearings has no doubt been driven, in part, by the #MeToo movement and the growing intolerance for sexual misconduct in our culture. Institutions of higher education have been at the forefront of this culture change, spurred by student activism and increased federal focus on Title IX protections for students since 2011.

Perhaps this is why campuses in particular, were so invested in the events of last week. Many institutions held gatherings so that students, faculty and staff from across campus could watch the hearings collectively. Some professors showed the testimonies of Dr. Blasey-Ford and Kavanaugh as part of their classes last week. Perhaps it is the fact that many campuses have done so much work on this issue that made these hearings salient for everyone at the institution. Maybe it is due to programs like Culture of Respect on campuses that educate students and train faculty and staff to respond to disclosures and reports of sexual assault with kindness and a trauma-informed approach. Student affairs educators work hard to teach our students that a survivor's alcohol use isn't a reason to blame a victim for what happened. Most students understand that delayed reporting is, in fact, normal. Student conduct officers have now been trained in trauma-informed interviewing which takes into account disjointed or piecemeal memories, without questioning the credibility of the complainant.

Maybe it is all of these reasons collectively that the hearings so captivated our students, faculty and staff last week. Student affairs educators sat alongside students watching the hearings, often in dismay that so many of the important messages we have tried to impress upon students about sexual assault in recent years seemed to unravel in front of us. Adding to this anxiety is the fact that the hearings come during a time when the Department of Education is prepared to make major changes to Title IX guidance that would significantly alter how institutions are able to address sexual misconduct.

One of the major changes in the leaked proposed rule is to limit institutions' requirement to conduct an investigation only to those incidents which occur on campus. This would leave many survivors to report to law enforcement any sexual assaults that occur by their peers, faculty members or other members of the campus community that simply don't occur on campus. The financial and educational costs to survivors are outlined in this 2016 piece from the The Yale Law Journal.

There are many lessons to be learned from the Kavanaugh hearings. Lessons about how far we have come on this issue in the campus context. And lessons about how far we, and the rest of the country, still have to go. The good news is that many campus administrators are fighting for the continued protection of survivors and the rights of all students in these processes. A recently released report indicates that during a public comment period on deregulation, the Department received 12,035 comments in support of Title IX regulations. Those comments came from "attorneys; college/university professors (of multiple disciplines, including law); family members or friends of accused students or student victims/survivors; non-profit professionals; people who work in state Departments of Education, school principals; students accused and/or found responsible of sexually harassing/assaulting other students; teachers; therapists and counselors (including those working in schools and colleges or universities); U.S. veterans; and victims/survivors of sexual violence (both students and non-students)" according to the report. Only 1% of the comments that the Department received on Title IX were in opposition to Title IX regulations for institutions.

In other words, the message to survivors of sexual violence needs to be not only that we, as institutions, believe you but that so many, many other people do too. As we await the final determination of the Senate regarding Kavanaugh's fate as a nominee, campuses can focus on messages to students demonstrating that campuses are committed to protecting those who have been harmed by sexual violence, and will continue to lead our country forward in supporting those who decide to come forward.

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The hearings for Supreme Court Justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh brought feverish attention late last week across the country and internationally, even for those who don't typically follow politics. The hearings included testimony by Dr. Christine Blasey-Ford, who bravely testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about being sexually assaulted in high school, an assault which Kavanaugh has been accused of committing.