EDITORIAL: Students shouldn’t have to sue their secretary of education

Over the last year, sexual assault and harassment have been in the news perhaps more than ever before, as big names like Bill O’Reilly and Harvey Weinstein have been ousted for their years of manipulation and misconduct. In the midst of this mess, let us not forget that rape can happen anywhere, at any point, even in our own schools.

These on-campus assaults can be especially painful and traumatic, with victims who often have to continue to live alongside their rapists throughout investigations of the assault — if investigations are even begun at all, that is. And the White House hasn’t been doing anything to help.

In September, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos repealed Obama era guidelines requiring colleges to investigate all claims of sexual misconduct. On Thursday, three Massachusetts students, all with pending sexual assault cases, announced their intent to sue DeVos, according to an article in The Boston Globe.

Through last month’s repeal, DeVos sought to advocate for the rights of the accused — but these students are arguing that in doing so, DeVos and the Department of Education are violating their Title IX rights.

The students are aiming to stop policy change on the federal level — that’s no small undertaking. Odds are, this suit won’t make any significant impact on the way we address sexual assaults in U.S. schools. That is beside the point. What matters is that this case is reflective of a very real anger students have with DeVos and with the ways we think about sexual misconduct on campus.

The flip side of the situation is that DeVos’ actions will probably have very little large-scale impact themselves. Many schools, including Boston University, put out statements after the guidelines were repealed, saying their own policies and procedures regarding sexual assault would not change in light of DeVos’ recommendations.

But that’s not to say it’s not an important issue. One of the women in this lawsuit was a student here at BU when she was sexually assaulted, and even though BU did not alter its policies under DeVos’ guidance, she still felt what DeVos did had enough of an impact that it was worth bringing to court.

In repealing Obama’s guidelines, DeVos was just making a statement — and it spoke volumes. She was showing students in the United States that instead of making the victims a priority, we should be focusing our attention on the accused. In a country where reporting rates for sexual assault are staggeringly low and false accusations are almost non-existent, this is just backwards.

This doesn’t mean the accused shouldn’t have any rights. Of course they should. Being innocent until proven guilty must still be of the utmost importance, but there’s so much more to it than that. When women don’t feel like their accusations of sexual assault will be taken seriously, the conversation is over before it was even started.

It’s so frustrating when some of the people in our highest offices — the people with the real power to make policy changes — aren’t doing anything about this massive problem.

Any move that is working against Title IX is bound to be bad for women. The entire point of Title IX is ensuring equal rights for women on college campuses — it just doesn’t make sense to try and dispute that. Sure, we didn’t see any change in policy here at BU, but there are a lot of schools a lot less liberal than we are, and we don’t know how those schools might’ve been impacted by DeVos’ repeal. That’s why these kinds of actions matter.

We don’t know how this court case will play out. This is a huge thing for these students to try and tackle — and even if they do win, it won’t stop assaults from happening. But it would do something to change the culture we are building on campuses around sexual assault.

Our secretary of education isn’t advocating for these students, so they are stepping up and advocating for themselves. It shouldn’t take something so extreme for victims to be taken seriously — on or off campus.

The power to create policies that deter attackers and support victims resides squarely on our elected officials. They need to step up.