Kafkaesque Example of a College Title IX Prosecution Under the Obama Rules

I did not vote for Trump and I find him generally deplorable. However, the new Title IX college sexual harassment rules implemented by Trump and Betsy DeVos are well supported by the case law and are an enormous improvement over the version of the rules implemented by Obama.

What could possibly go wrong under the Obama version of the rules? Listen to this horrific miscarriage of justice described by attorney Lara Bazelon, speaking with Glenn Loury.

The proposed new Title IX rules by Joe Biden will be a catastrophically bad miscarriage of justice. FIRE (The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression) points out the many problems with Biden's proposed rules:

Rejecting the definition of student-on-student harassment set by the Supreme Court in Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education.

Requiring institutions to police speech and sexuality worldwide, not just in programs and activities on and around campus.

Requiring institutions to issue gag orders on the parties and their advocates that prevent them from disclosing “information and evidence obtained solely through the sex-based harassment grievance procedures,” meaning institutions of higher education are now required to enforce prior restraint and content-based restrictions on students’ speech or the speech of those advocating on their behalf.

Revoking the current requirement that accused students must be offered an opportunity to have a live hearing to contest the allegations against them.

Eliminating the right to a live hearing to contest claims, and thus also eliminating the right to cross-examination.

Allowing a single investigator to both investigate and adjudicate complaints, dramatically increasing the odds that one person’s bias, subconscious or otherwise, permeates the process. Such a system increases the likelihood of error, thus increasing the likelihood that accused students will be unfairly deprived of their access to educational opportunities or benefits.

If finalized, these and many other proposed provisions will mark a new, and unfortunately familiar, era of Title IX hearings in which institutions of higher education fail to protect the First Amendment and due process rights of students and faculty, likely resulting in costly litigation for institutions to ensure these basic protections are met.

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FIRE Files Suit to Address First Amendment Problems with Florida’s “Stop Woke Act”

Once again, FIRE steps up when First Amendment rights are threatened. No matter where someone is on the political spectrum, good intentions are a poor guide to abiding by the First Amendment. This time, the problem is Florida's Stop Woke Act. Excerpt from FIRE's press release:

The First Amendment doesn’t allow Florida law to declare which concepts are too challenging for students and faculty to discuss in a college classroom.

Stop WOKE Act restricts college student and faculty members’ ability to play devil’s advocate, express viewpoints University of South Florida’s First Amendment Forum is the first student group to challenge the law in court TAMPA, Fla., Sept. 6, 2022 — To protect free speech, the government must censor. That’s the absurd argument put forth by Florida lawmakers in the controversial “Stop WOKE Act.”

The law suppresses viewpoints disfavored by Florida lawmakers, threatens tens of millions of dollars in annual funding for universities that don’t crack down on faculty who “promote” an opinion on a government blacklist, and encourages people to report other Americans to government authorities if they “advance” those views — all in the name of “individual freedom.”

Today, a professor and student group from the University of South Florida sued to protect professors’ ability to teach and students’ ability to learn. The lawsuit, filed by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, alleges that the higher education provisions of Florida’s “Individual Freedom” law (dubbed the “Stop WOKE Act” by its proponents), impermissibly chill free expression and promote unconstitutional censorship on the state’s college campuses.

“Without the freedom to engage in vigorous and robust debate about important issues and contentious concepts, a college education is just an exercise in memorizing facts and repeating government-approved viewpoints,” said FIRE attorney Adam Steinbaugh. “That’s not freedom or education.”

The Stop WOKE Act, passed on an exclusively party-line vote and signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis on April 22, prohibits “instruction” on eight specific “concepts” related to “race, color, national origin, or sex”that may run counter to government officials’ notions of “freedom.” For example, the bill unlawfully restricts discussions of advantages or disadvantages of a particular race or sex; whether individuals are unconsciously biased based on race or sex; and whether certain virtues — including “merit, excellence, hard work, fairness, neutrality, objectivity, and racial colorblindness” — are racist.

But in restricting which ideas may be considered in a college classroom, Florida’s political leaders ran headlong into the First Amendment.

Continue ReadingFIRE Files Suit to Address First Amendment Problems with Florida’s “Stop Woke Act”

Maybe Next Time There is a Pandemic, We Will Do a Cost-Benefit Analysis Before Shutting Down Schools

Excerpt from a new article at Reason: New Data Show COVID School Closures Contributed to Largest Learning Loss in Decades: Teachers unions and progressive politicians pushed for school closures during the pandemic.

Last week, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) released new data showing a dramatic decline in test scores among American 9-year-olds since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The data indicate a devastating learning loss among American schoolchildren, marking the largest decline in reading scores since 1990, and the first ever recorded drop in mathematics scores.

These results come from a special administration of the National Assessment of Educational Progress long-term trend (LTT) assessments, which measured reading and mathematics outcomes among 9-year-olds. Since its inception, the LTT has tracked a steady rise in educational performance among 9-year-olds. However, from 2020 to 2022, the LTT revealed a steep drop in 9-year-old students' performance. Reading scores dropped by five points over the two-year period, while mathematics scores dropped by seven points. In all, the decline in test scores represents the reversal of around two decades of improvement in math and reading scores.

"These results are sobering," Peggy G. Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, told The Washington Post. "It's clear that covid-19 shocked American education and stunted the academic growth of this age group."

Glenn Greenwald was excoriated by many people when he suggested (in August 2021) that we do a cost-benefit analysis before shutting down schools. We do such a cost-benefit analysis in most other walks of life, such as automobile safety. We failed to think rationally with regard to our schools and now we've hurt millions of children. Too many of us became obsessed with achieving something that clearly impossible: Zero Covid." Too many of us were not interested in looking at statistics showing that Covid presented only a tiny risk to most school children. We did not follow the science.  Why are so many people still not willing to admit that Ron DeSantis made the right call about keeping the schools open in Florida? Why am I not confident that we've learned a damned thing from this tragedy?

Continue ReadingMaybe Next Time There is a Pandemic, We Will Do a Cost-Benefit Analysis Before Shutting Down Schools