Sex assault victims can speak out on
campus
Confidentiality policy violates federal law,
Education Dept. says
By Amy Argetsinger
www.washingtonpost.com
Updated: 4:34 a.m. ET July 29, 2004
When Kate Dieringer learned that the fellow student whom
she had accused of raping her in her first month at Georgetown University
would be suspended from the college for a year rather than expelled, she
was outraged. "I wanted to tell everyone," she said.
Yet she couldn't: In order to learn the results of the
young man's campus disciplinary hearings in the spring of 2002, she had
signed a form promising not to share them with anyone, except for her
parents and one close adviser.
Such confidentiality pledges have been standard on many
college campuses, and administrators have generally argued that they are
necessary to maintain the federally mandated privacy shrouding most
student records. But in response to a complaint filed by Dieringer, the
U.S. Department of Education told Georgetown this week that its policy
violates a federal campus crime law. Campus safety watchdogs are hailing
the order as a major victory for sexual assault victims at colleges
nationwide.
Exposing selective punishments?
The decision could encourage victims to shine a light into the often
secretive workings of collegiate disciplinary systems -- and even warn
fellow students about their alleged attackers, said S. Daniel Carter,
senior vice president of Security on Campus Inc., a nonprofit group that
monitors campus crime and judicial programs.
"Colleges can no longer silence campus rape victims," he said. Asked if
the decision would prompt victims to publicize details of accused
students' punishments in campus media, Carter responded, "That is
certainly what we hope."
Others in higher education played down the significance and expressed
concern about airing the results of disciplinary cases. In sharing the
outcome of campus hearings with victims, "the desire here is to help an
individual through a difficult time," said Sheldon E. Steinbach, vice
president and general counsel for the American Council on Education.
"It is not designed as a hook for future litigation, nor for pillorying an
individual," he said.
The Department of Education's order apparently applies only to cases
involving sexual assault, as governed by a 1992 law known as the Campus
Sexual Assault Victims' Bill of Rights, which requires that victims
receive information about disciplinary proceedings without any conditions
or limitations.
The systems in place on most college campuses to handle matters ranging
from drinking violations to cheating to assault are a perennial source of
controversy, with both victims and the accused often complaining they are
not treated fairly.
Veil of secrecy
The particulars of those cases are often hard to assess, though, because
most colleges conduct such actions under the veil of confidentiality.
College officials say the secrecy -- including the nondisclosure
agreements -- is rooted in their view that such proceedings are part of
the students' education and therefore protected under the federal Family
Educational Rights and Privacy Act.
While there is nothing to prevent a student who is assaulted by a
classmate from pursuing charges publicly through the criminal justice
system -- regardless of whether the student also files a complaint on
campus -- many choose to seek action only through the confidential college
disciplinary channels.
That was the route chosen by Dieringer, seven months after she alleges she
was assaulted by an older student in September 2001. She said the man
separated her from friends and pulled her into his apartment after a night
of heavy drinking.
Dieringer also alleged that the man, who was at the time serving as an
official adviser for new students, might have drugged her.
According to documents from the Department of Education, a Georgetown
hearing board -- composed of students and faculty -- determined that
Dieringer's account was credible and decided to punish the student with
expulsion. However, the man appealed his case, and an appeals board
reduced his sanction to a one-year suspension.
Dieringer, a 21-year-old senior from Bridgeport, W.Va., said she felt the
reduced punishment represented a failure of Georgetown's disciplinary
process. "Obviously, the system was faulty and needed fixing," she said in
an interview.
Accountability vs. confidentiality
In an unrelated investigation prompted by a separate complaint from
Dieringer, the Department of Education this spring determined that
Georgetown's investigation and hearing did not reflect any discrimination
against Dieringer or violate her rights.
But Dieringer, who still believes she was wronged by the process,
complains that she was stymied from mounting a public critique of
Georgetown's system because the nondisclosure agreement prohibited her
from sharing details of the hearings or their outcome.
Todd A. Olson, Georgetown's vice president for student affairs, said the
university was using the nondisclosure agreements to try to uphold its
students' rights to privacy. He said the school will change its policy to
reflect the Department of Education's order.
"It involves a difficult balancing act between accountability and
confidentiality, and we'll continue to walk that line as carefully as we
can," Olson said.
Others see more sinister intent behind colleges' confidentiality policies.
Bill Shaw of Shaker Heights, Ohio, said his 19-year-old daughter was
compelled to sign such an agreement after being assaulted in April at a
party at Bates College in Maine.
"The whole thing is an attempt to keep things quiet, to put her under
duress," he said. Bates officials declined to comment.
Yet some in higher education say they don't believe the Georgetown order
will prove a watershed for student victims. Most students involved in such
cases don't want to publicize them, said Gary Pavela, director of judicial
programs at the University of Maryland, which has not required
nondisclosure agreements. And students who want to publicize their cases
were probably never deterred in the first place, he said.
"People who have a strong interest in the outcomes will go to the media,"
Pavela said, "and will not be deterred by some piece of paper."
© 2004 The Washington Post Company
