Washington Update

Biden Administration Receives 240,000 Comments on Title IX

NAICU joined the higher education community in submitting detailed public comments on President Biden’s proposed Title IX regulations. Published in July, the new rules would amend current requirements governing how colleges and universities handle sex discrimination. 

Under the next step in the rulemaking process, the Department of Education must review the public comments before issuing final rules, which will likely differ somewhat from the proposed regulations. With over 240,000 submitted comments to review, the Department is not expected to issue final rules for a year or more.

Drafted by a working group formed by representatives of partner higher education associations, including NAICU, and led by the American Council on Education (ACE), the 24-page community comment letter provides the Department with detailed feedback regarding the proposed rules and how they would affect college campuses.

Specifically, the comments thank the Department for proposing several provisions that will help institutions better address sex-based discrimination, including provisions that will provide campuses with greater flexibility in administering the disciplinary process, better protect victims of sex discrimination, and maintain procedural protections for accused students. 

The comment letter also cites several implementation challenges – such as the applicability of the final rules to pending complaints and the effective date of the final rules – and makes recommendations regarding how best to address these challenges. Finally, the comment letter identifies provisions in the proposed rules that would benefit from increased flexibility or clarity to help minimize unintended consequences and advance institutional efforts to address sex-based discrimination. 

For more information, please contact:
Jody Feder

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