12:00pm Eastern Time, To register for any of the programs Register.

Please contact Section Associate Director, Caroline Walters, with any questions about the series: caroline.walters@americanbar.org

Thursday, January 7, 2016
Part 1 – Campus Sexual Assault: The Problem

This program will explore the breadth of the problem of sexual assault on college campuses, including such questions as: What does the data show? What are the holes in the data? Why are freshman women especially vulnerable? Who are the perpetrators? Is there a rape culture on campus? Why do so few women report assaults? Why have schools been slow to respond? What are the consequences for women’s education and the rest of their lives?

Speakers will include:
•Jennifer Freyd, Professor, University of Oregon
•Zoe Ridolfi-Starr, Deputy Director for Youth Power and Strategic Partnerships, Know Your IX

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Thursday, January 21, 2016
Part 2 – Campus Sexual Assault: Not Just a Crime

This program will focus on the civil rights implications of campus sexual assault. Sexual assault is not just a crime. It is also an extreme form of sex harassment. Just as employers must rid workplaces of sexual harassment, colleges must rid their campuses of it so that women receive equal access to education. What does the law say about it? Why is it so important that schools address the issue and that women have reporting options besides the police?

Speakers will include:
•Nancy Cantalupo, Professor, Barry University – Dwayne O. Andreas School of Law
•Fatima Goss Graves, Senior Vice President for Program, National Women’s Law Center
•Laura Eagan, Director of Training and Technical Assistance, Clery Center for Security on Campus

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Thursday, February 11, 2016
Part 3 – Campus Sexual Assault: The Government Response

This program will focus on how the federal government is responding to the problem of campus sexual assault. The Department of Education issued a 2011 “Dear Colleague” letter that reminded schools of their Title IX obligations to provide students with environments free of sexual harassment and assault. Congress responded by adding the Campus Save Act to the Violence Against Women Act. How are these laws being implemented? How is the Office for Civil Rights enforcing the new guidance? How many schools are under investigation? How is OCR resolving the complaints? How do survivors and their lawyers experience the administrative process? What could improve that process?

Speakers will include:
•Rachel Gettler, U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights
•Ashley Higgins, U.S. Department of Education, Campus Save
•Cari Simon, Bode & Fierberg

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Thursday, February 25, 2016
Part 4 – Campus Sexual Assault: What are schools doing (or not doing) about it?

This program will explore what schools are doing about campus sexual assault. How are schools responding to new public and government scrutiny? How are they implementing new laws and guidance? How do they handle survivor complaints? What kinds of “best practices” are being developed? What should schools be doing to tackle the problem?

Speakers will include:
•Catherine Carroll, Title IX Coordinator, University of Maryland
•Laura Dunn, Executive Director, SurvJustice
•Brett Sokolow, Risk Management, National Center for Higher Education

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Thursday, March 10, 2016
Part 5 – Campus Sexual Assault: Role of Courts

This program will explore the legal claims survivors of sexual assault have against their schools, how courts are applying existing law, and what kinds of remedies are available. The program also will examine how the legal standards for sexual harassment/assault under Title IX differ from those of Title VII and whether reform is necessary to hold schools accountable.

Speakers will include:
•Adele Kimmel, Senior Attorney, Public Justice
•John Clune, Of Counsel, Hutchinson Black & Cook

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Thursday, March 24, 2016
Part 6 – Campus Sexual Assault: Next Steps

This program will explore what can and should be done to address campus sexual assault. From new legislation to better education of students and educators, the program will explore how social science and the law can work together to combat this national epidemic.

Commission on Domestic & Sexual Violence Commission on Women in the Profession

*The content of this programming does not meet requirements for continuing legal education (CLE) accreditation. You will not receive CLE credit for listening.

The November 19th CNN broadcast of The Hunting Ground documentary was postponed until November 22nd due to coverage of Paris terrorist attacks. The viewing gave us a chance to educate millions of people about the mishandling of sexual assault on college and university campuses. The documentary is an exposé of rape crimes on U.S. college campuses, their institutional cover-ups, and the devastating toll they take on students and their families. 147 university campuses have ongoing investigations. 91% of campus report to reports of rapes or sexual assaults. Victims tell us that they are afraid to report and that the subsequent dealings with campus administrators is far worse than the rape itself.

On October 24th, AAUW-NM held a productive Fall Workshop hosted by the Portales Student Affiliate Branch@ ENMU. One of the AAUW / AAUW-NM initiatives for the next couple years which was presented involves working with our local school districts to access their implementation of Title IX. Every branch of AAUW is encouraged to contact the schools in their respective districts to determine the person responsible for Title IX and to discuss how their schools are complying with the many facets of this law.

At the AAUW Convention in San Diego this past summer, one of the keynote speakers was Catherine Lhamon, Assistant Secretary of Civil Rights at the Department of Education. Her speech covering Title IX was dynamic and informative. For our Online Branch program this month, you are encouraged to go to the AAUW web site and view Catherine Lhamon’s speech. How to you get there?: Go to aauw.org then click on “Convention”, then click on “Resources and Materials”, then click on “Speakers”, she is the second video on that page.

In addition to the speech, there are other resources with tons of information regarding the breadth of Title IX available on the AAUW web site. The easiest way to find information on the aauw.org site is to type what you are looking for into the “search” box at the top of the home page.

Last year, we invited you to join AAUW in using gender equality to guide your bracket selections; and this year, we are at it again! It is disheartening that women coaches are still so significantly underpaid compared with their male counterparts. Plus, all the coaches for men’s sports teams are still paid more — often significantly more — on average than coaches for women’s sports.
Betting on schools with smaller gender pay gaps is also a great way to promote one of the NCAA’s stated values: a commitment to an inclusive culture that fosters equitable participation for student athletes and career opportunities for coaches and administrators from diverse backgrounds.
AAUW’s salary showdown brackets predict the victors of the women’s and men’s championships by calculating the gap between the average head coach salary for women’s and men’s teams at each school in the tournament and then advancing the school with the smaller gender pay gap to the next round.
According to our brackets, we are once again sporting red and blue in honor of the University of Dayton. In both the women’s and men’s brackets, the University of Dayton comes out victorious. At Dayton, the salaries women’s sports head coaches earn are, on average, 93 percent of what men’s sports head coaches earn.
If our brackets play out, Dayton, an 11 seed in the men’s bracket and a 7 seed in the women’s bracket, would achieve the feat of securing the men’s and women’s championships concurrently. Though Dayton is the only school to be in the final four for both of our salary showdown brackets, by our count 22 teams — out of the men’s 68 total and the women’s 64 total — are in both brackets.
Men’s bracket breakdown: Our analysis predicts a lot of upsets. If our brackets played out, all the men’s number 1 and number 2 seeds, all but Notre Dame of the number 3 seeds, and all the number 4 seeds would lose their first games. Joining Dayton in the final four are Davidson (73 percent pay gap), Hampton (68 percent pay gap), and Harvard (63 percent pay gap).

March 30, 2015
Time: 2–6 p.m. EST
Location: Your computer (Register at aauw.org)
Registration Deadline: March 18, 2015
Join AAUW’s Virtual Graduate School Fair, hosted by StudentPerch.

The virtual fair connects candidates with a broad range of graduate programs, such as public policy, business, and the science, technology, engineering, and math fields.

Take advantage of this convenient way to discuss opportunities without ever leaving your desk!

Participants will have access to the following:
•Private one-on-one chat capability
•Student attendee profiles (including résumé and LinkedIn profile)
•Exhibitors’ branded virtual booths
•Graduate program names on pre-event welcome page

Cost:
•FREE for students
•Exhibitor prices will vary. AAUW college/university partner members will receive a discounted rate.

You wouldn’t expect an NBA/WNBA practice court on a Sunday morning to be filled with the sound of basketballs swooshing through the net or the sound of feet pounding on freshly shined wood.

An even more unlikely scenario? All of that noise and activity coming from nearly 100 girls, ages 8 to 18, instead of professional basketball players.

Yet that’s exactly what happened on Sunday as part of AAUW’s kick-off to the 42nd anniversary of Title IX, the law that opened the door for greater athletic participation by girls, among other gains in the field of education. Sunday’s activity featured an obstacle course simulating the real-life barriers girls still face in gaining the same athletic opportunities as their male peers – whether the barrier is fair scheduling for games, comparable equipment and facilities, or the overall number of athletic participation opportunities available to boys and girls.

Although we’ve made great progress with 42 years of Title IX, today’s athletes need your help to break down a significant barrier that still remains: a lack of information.

Unlike colleges, high schools are not required to release data on equity in sports, making it difficult for parents, students, and high schools to determine if boys and girls have equal access to athletic opportunities. The High School Data Transparency Act (H.R. 455/S. 217) would address this gap by requiring high schools to report basic data on the number of female and male students in their athletic programs and the expenditures made for their sports teams.

TAKE ACTION: Urge your elected officials to co-sponsor the High School Data Transparency Act (H.R. 455/S. 217).

On Tuesday the Departments of Education and Justice issued guidance to schools reminding them that all children have the right to a public school education. The guidance told schools to relax their scrutiny of students’ citizenship and immigration status, which can deter students from enrolling or attending schools. The departments told schools these practices “contravene” federal law.