By Brendan W. Clark ’21
Editor-in-Chief
Brooke LePage ’19, a Public Policy and Law alumna. Photo courtesy of Brooke LePage.
PBPL alumna Brooke LePage ’19, a FutureEd policy associate and student at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy recently wrote for FutureEd on the future of Title IX, the landmark federal civil rights law addressing gender equity and sex-based discrimination.
LePage, who wrote her 2019 thesis on Title IX policy, analyzes in her piece the complexities of undoing the Trump administration’s rule change to Title IX enforcement and policy that was announced in the waning days of the administration.
In her piece, LePage argues for a balanced approach and a thoughtful review, noting that the Department of Education under Biden should “restore successful elements of the Obama administration’s approach to Title IX while addressing some legitimate problems identified by DeVos’s team.”
LePage encourages the new administration to include in its guidance more opportunities “to report instances of sexual harassment both to protect accusers from retaliation and so that schools can have accurate data.”
Also addressed are definitional changes, which LePage views as limiting, especially in DeVos’ definition of sexual harassment, which limits conduct to that which is “so severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive that it denies a person equal educational access.” Under Obama, which LePage advocates a return to, sexual harassment included the broader “unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature.”
You can read LePage’s full argument in FutureEd here.