NY GOV CUOMO’S Discrimination Against Males Is Highlighted In NY TitleIX Statistics
There are few good campus situations for accused students in the aftermath of President Obama’s Dear Colleague letter; virtually every school uses a process that at least in some way tilts toward the accuser. As a rule, however, students will have a better chance at public universities than at private schools, since public institutions need to provide at least minimal due process protections under the Constitution.
New York, it appears, is the exception to this pattern. Figures released in late December revealed the results of all Title IX adjudications in the state for the calendar year 2018. Overall, just under 60 percent of adjudications ended with a guilty finding against the accused student. But the percentage was much higher at the state’s public schools—63.3 percent at SUNY and a shocking 78.5 percent at CUNY.
It’s not hard to detect a possible reason why: Andrew Cuomo. The New York governor appoints the majority of both the SUNY and CUNY board, and few politicians are as strongly opposed to fair treatment for students accused in the Title IX process than Cuomo. He was the driving force behind the 2016 “Enough Is Enough” law, whose procedures had the effect, and likely the intent, of tilting the Title IX adjudication process even further in favor of accusers. In perhaps the statute’s most troubling provision, the law informs universities that they must leave accusers “free from any suggestion” that they are “at fault when these crimes and violations are committed or should have acted in a different manner to avoid such crimes or violations.” But, of course, what the statute terms “the reporting individual” might not be truthful—and therefore would be “at fault.” A system that rules out such a possibility is biased from the start.
mindingthecampus.org KC Johnson
