In the spring of 2017, a student at Humboldt State University filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education, San Francisco Office for Civil Rights (OCR). She alleged that the university discriminated against her on the basis of her sex because administrators did not respond to her complaint of sexual assault promptly or equitably. The university took over seven months to investigate her complaint, failed to offer her interim measures until five months after she made a complaint, failed to provide her with notice of the outcome of the investigation until a month after it was complete, and refused to effectively enforce the no contact order the school put in place to prevent harassment.

After several months of investigation, OCR announced on November 2, 2017 that it identified a number of areas in which Humboldt State failed to comply with Title IX. Although OCR concluded that the university’s provision of notice of the outcome of the investigation and interim measures were sufficiently prompt, it found that the university’s failure to enforce the no contact order and its delayed investigation were not sufficiently prompt and thus violated Title IX.

To resolve these concerns, OCR and Humboldt State entered into a resolution agreement where it agreed to make a number of changes to its policies and practices including:

• Developing protocols to ensure effective communication between parties involved in Title IX proceedings;


• Providing training to all staff involved in Title IX policies and the new protocols; and


• Submitting to ongoing monitoring by OCR to ensure compliance with the agreement.
  
  Because there has been no further activity on the docket, the case is presumed closed.
  
  Hope Brinn - 01/09/2019
  
  
  compress summary