Reporting is not supporting: Why mandatory supporting, not mandatory reporting, must guide university sexual misconduct policies

Abstract

Policies that require most or all university employees to report any sexual misconduct they learn about to a designated university official, including victims’ names, even if the victim does not want such a report to be made, have been widely implemented in institutions of higher education (1). Despite the widely held belief that these “universal” mandatory reporting policies are both necessary and effective for addressing sexual misconduct, Title IX guidance and rulemaking have never required this practice and there is little evidence that confirms the efficacy of these policies (1, 2). As the Biden administration considers changes to the 2020 Title IX regulations and state legislatures consider laws that impose broad mandatory reporting policies in higher education (e.g., Texas Senate Bill 212 passed in 2019 and California Senate Bill 493 passed in 2020), we must evaluate the impact of broad mandatory reporting policies that compel involuntary disclosure and implement evidence-based, survivor-centered ways to provide effective support to victims of sexual misconduct in higher education. The National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) has engaged this issue through its 2018 report Sexual Harassment of Women: Climate, Culture, and Consequences in Academic Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (3), pointing to growing research on the negative effects of universal mandatory reporting. At the 2020 Public Summit, the NASEM Action Collaborative on Preventing Sexual Harassment in Higher Education convened Title IX practitioners and sexual violence researchers to further examine the consequences of universal mandatory reporting for survivors and employees, particularly when reports must include the victim’s name and when targets of sexual misconduct do not wish to report their experience to a university official. In this article, we build upon the discussions held in this panel and suggest alternative reporting policies that will better support survivors. There are several problematic assumptions embedded in … [↵][1]1To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: kholland4{at}unl.edu. [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1

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