Title IX and Clery Act Training Requirements

Andrea Stagg, Director of Consulting Services
Jess Ettell Irvine, Clery Act Product Manager
Kevin Lineberger, Clery Act Services Specialist

The Title IX regulations and the Clery Act through its statute and regulations impose training requirements for the professionals implementing the respective policies. The Clery Act, through the Violence Against Women Act and Stop Campus Hazing Act amendments, also requires educational programming for the broader student and employee community on an ongoing basis. Information about the requirements found in both laws is detailed below. Professionals responsible for Title IX and Clery Act compliance should ensure they have carved out the time and any required budget to meet the minimum training standards detailed in these laws.

Title IX Training Requirements Under the 2020 Regulations

The Title IX regulations require schools to ensure that professionals implementing their Title IX policy and procedures have certain training. Specifically, Title IX Coordinators, investigators, decision-makers, and informal resolution facilitators must receive training on the following:

the definition of sexual harassment in § 106.30
the scope of the school’s education program or activity
how to conduct an investigation and grievance process (including hearings, appeals, and informal resolution processes, as applicable)
how to serve impartially, including by avoiding prejudgment of the facts at issue, conflicts of interest, and bias

Decision-makers must also receive training on any technology to be used at a live hearing and on issues of relevance relating to questions and evidence. This training must notify decision-makers that questions and evidence about the complainant’s sexual predisposition or prior sexual behavior are not relevant.

Investigators also must receive training on issues of relevance so they can create an investigative report that fairly summarizes the relevant evidence.

The regulations do not say much else about the training content, only that the training must not rely on sex stereotypes and must promote impartial investigations and adjudications of formal complaints of sexual harassment. And Title IX does not include training requirements for other employees or for students.

Remember that under the regulations, any materials used to train these professionals (whether they are employees or external resources) must be made available on the institution’s website. Specifically, institutions must post: “All materials used to train Title IX Coordinators, investigators, decision-makers, and any person who facilitates an informal resolution process.” The materials should be easy to find so that compliance can be discerned quickly.

The Title IX Regulations are silent on the frequency of training. However, institutions are expected to ensure that personnel are sufficiently trained to carry out their roles competently and in compliance with the regulations—a standard that, in practice, aligns with recurring (often annual) training models.

Clery Act Training Requirements

The Clery Act does not explicitly require Campus Security Authorities (CSAs) to be trained, but the U.S. Department of Education has consistently cited a lack of training in program reviews. Specifically, program reviews cite “Lack of Administrative Capability” and infer that lack of training across campus results in failure to properly report and failure to maintain a system where CSAs understand crime classifications and follow designated reporting channels to collect crime statistics.

Following analysis of program reviews and recommendations from the Department of Education, we recommend CSA’s have training covering:

The purpose and key requirements of the Clery Act
Identifying and applying Clery Act geography classifications
Recognizing Clery Act reportable crimes and policy violations
Understanding how to properly report Clery Act crimes

The importance of properly trained CSA’s cannot be understated. When a CSA promptly notifies the appropriate parties about reported crimes and incidents, the institution can send emergency notifications or timely warnings as needed, update the crime log, and compile its statistics for the Annual Security Report.

Violence Against Women Act Amendments to Clery Act

Next, we’ll dive into the Clery Act – the Clery Act has specific training requirements laid out in two amendments—the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA, statute and regulations) and the Stop Campus Hazing Act (SCHA, just statute so far).

The VAWA training requirements overlap with Title IX in that training is required for the “officials” who conduct the disciplinary procedures for the VAWA crimes (dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking). These individuals must be trained annually on issues related to these crimes and “on how to conduct an investigation and hearing process that protects the safety of victims and promotes accountability.”

The Clery Act also requires primary prevention and awareness programs for all incoming students and new employees, and ongoing awareness campaigns for continuing members of the campus community.

Consistent with the statute (20 U.S.C. 1092(f)(8), these primary prevention and awareness programs must include the following:

A statement prohibiting the VAWA crimes
The definition of each VAWA crime
The definition of consent, in reference to sexual activity, in the applicable jurisdiction
Safe and positive options for bystander intervention that may be carried out by an individual to prevent harm or intervene in cases of a risk of a VAWA crime
Information on risk reduction to recognize warning signs of abusive behavior and how to avoid potential attacks
Ongoing prevention and awareness campaigns for students and faculty on all of the above
Possible sanctions and protective measures that the institution may impose in cases of VAWA crimes
Procedures victims should follow if one of these crimes has occurred, including evidence preservation, how to report either on or off campus, and more
Institutional disciplinary procedures
Confidentiality protections for victims
Existing counseling, health, mental health, legal assistance, and other services available on-campus and/or in the community
Availability of supportive measures, such as available assistance in changing academic, living, transportation, and working situations

For continuing employees and students, the institution must offer ongoing prevention and awareness campaigns. These are defined in the regulations as initiatives or strategies that are varied and deployed over time to create an increased understanding on topics related to preventing and addressing the VAWA crimes. Remember that these initiatives should include both primary and secondary efforts. Primary prevention aims to stop domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking before they occur by preventing first-time perpetration and victimization. Secondary prevention focuses on identifying and addressing risk factors that could lead to these harms. Prevention differs from outreach, which is intended to inform victims and potential victims about available services (28 CFR 90.2(d)).

Stop Campus Hazing Act Amendments to the Clery Act

The Stop Campus Hazing Act requires institutions to establish research-informed prevention and awareness programs designed to reach students, staff, and faculty that explain campus policies related to hazing, how to report hazing, how the institution investigates hazing incidents, and the applicable laws in that jurisdiction about hazing. These prevention programs must include primary prevention strategies, which means content describing how to stop hazing before it occurs. As per the statute, such programming might include bystander intervention, strategies for building group cohesion without hazing, and information about ethical leadership.

Conclusion

Both Title IX and the Clery Act include training requirements, and some of them overlap. And many states have additional workplace training requirements, such as sexual harassment prevention or workplace safety.

Consider how the Title IX and Clery Act requirements fit into the regular training schedule for your institution—can any of these trainings be combined and harmonized? Would spreading them out help reinforce the content and serve as “ongoing prevention and awareness”? Make a plan to collect data about offered trainings, such as how it is advertised, how many people attend, and any feedback on the training. Collect the feedback using an anonymous evaluation form to get feedback from attendees and aggregate the feedback to turn it into actionable steps.

Visit our Training and our Training Membership pages to find training sessions that fit your requirements.