Call for Title IX Involvement

We are in the process of building our Title IX team! Title IX is the federal legislation that prohibits discrimination based on sex at any institution receiving federal funds. Sex discrimination has been interpreted to include not only discrimination based on sex or gender, but also sexual harassment, sexual assault, stalking, domestic and dating violence, discrimination based on pregnant or parenting status, and most recently, discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

The current Title IX grievance procedure requires many moving parts and provides opportunities for many people to be involved. As such, we are recruiting investigators, hearing officers, appellate officers, and advisors for our process. Investigators, Hearing Officers, and Appellate Officers must act without bias and impartially. There are training responsibilities for all of these roles, we will send you information about the training requirements. Below please find a brief definition of each role:

Investigators: Look into the complaint’s allegations, which includes interviewing parties and witnesses, reviewing evidence gathered. Then, the investigators make a recommendation based on the preponderance of the evidence whether there was a violation of the College’s Sexual Misconduct policy. They write an investigation report summarizing the information reviewed and explaining how they came to their recommendation. For more information, please contact Lauren McKown or refer to page 17-18 of NOVA’s Sexual Misconduct Policy.

Hearing Officers: Review the investigation report, conduct a hearing, and make a decision whether they agree with the investigator’s recommendation. If they have found that there was a violation of the College’s policy, they will determine what sanctions are appropriate. For more information, please contact Lauren or refer to page 21-22 of NOVA’s Sexual Misconduct Policy.

Appellate Officers: Review the case record, including investigation report, hearing materials, and decisions, to determine if the appellate argument warrants a different outcome to the underlying complaint. For more information, please contact Lauren or refer to page 23-24 of NOVA’s Sexual Misconduct Policy.

Advisors: Provide assistance to the parties during the course of the investigation, hearing, and appeal, if filed. They must provide good faith guidance through the process. During the hearing, the advisor is required to submit questions on the behalf of their assigned party, they do not act as an attorney would in court and do not have to prepare the questions for their party. For more information, please contact Lauren or refer to page 21 of NOVA’s Sexual Misconduct Policy.

If you are interested in serving as a Title IX investigator, hearing officer, appellate reviewer, advisor, or Respondent navigator, send an email to titleix@nvcc.edu or lmckown@nvcc.edu and we’ll be in touch with more info! If you have questions that you’d like to discuss with a phone call, feel free to reach out at 703.323.2262. Simply indicating your interest doesn’t mean that you’re committed forever – you can bow out at any time. We look forward to hearing from you!

Submitted by:
Lauren McKown, lmckown@nvcc.edu