AFTER a semester's worth of collaboration and effort, a new set of sexual assault procedures have been released. These changes are designed not only to strengthen punishments against sexual offenders but also to facilitate the adjudication process, both in speed and efficiency. While the passage of such alterations is certainly a large and wonderful step forward, it should by no justification be the last.
While many specific changes and revisions were made, it is more important to understand their general aims. For example, after much protest from active students, the revisions included changing the language so that it had more "regard to confidentiality and disclosures permitted by federal law," according to Patricia Lampkin, vice president for student affairs.
Furthermore, similar protest has brought about a change in procedures so that convictions of sexual assault strongly imply the consideration of suspension or expulsion (which came short of many students' desire to have a single sanction for sexual assault).
On top of all this, revisions were made to encourage reporting cases of sexual assault, as well as conveying the notion that sanctions vary according to the severity of the act -- severe incidents of sexual assault will be treated more harshly than less severe incidents.
Also notable are the alterations to the Operating Principles used in guiding administrative procedures, one of which will establish a "permanent advisory committee on sexual assault" consisting of "students, faculty, and staff."
This advisory committee will be structured around the encouragement of sustained dialogue and will attempt to create and provide a permanent review of University support services and procedural options. Such changes are unequivocally necessary first steps in achieving the goal of redressing and preventing sexual assault.
While strides forward have obviously been made, simply changing policies does not translate into an efficacious handling of the problem. First of all, the policies must be treated as more than paper -- they must be effectively administered. For example, despite rhetoric to the contrary, the University still continues to face persistent and unalleviated racial problems. This contradiction is captured by the (almost commonplace) e-mails we receive that concomitantly report a racial incident while promising greater effort on behalf of the University to prevent such incidents
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