Minot State, 54 Other Universities Under Investigation for Alleged Title IX Violations

Facing mounting pressure from Congress, sexual assault survivors, and activists, the US Department of Education released a comprehensive list of colleges and universities that are under investigation for violating Title IX A total of 55 higher education institutions are under investigation by the Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights for allegedly mishandling sexual assault and harassment complaints on campus in violation of the gender equality law Title IX.

Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Catherine E. Lhamon said in a statement.

We are making this list available in an effort to bring more transparency to our enforcement work and to foster better public awareness of civil rights. We hope this increased transparency will spur community dialogue about this important issue. I also want to make it clear that a college or university's appearance on this list and being the subject of a Title IX investigation in no way indicates at this stage that the college or university is violating or has violated the law.

Minot State University is on the list of schools under investigation, along with Harvard Law, Arizona State, and the University of California-Berkeley. The complete list of schools can be found here.

This is the first time that a complete list of schools under investigation has been released. Previously, you only knew if a school was under investigation in you asked the DOE directly about a specific school.

If a college is found to be in violation of Title IX after a federal investigation, it often leads to some form of a resolution with the Education Department, which can entail rewriting policies, requiring staffing changes or other mandates. In some cases, the Education Department can refer the matter to another agency, such as the Department of Justice, or move to cut off a school from all federal funding. No higher education institution has ever lost federal funding due to Title IX violations.

[SOURCE]