Students are not satisfied with recent changes Winthrop University officials have made to the school’s sexual misconduct policy.
The updates to the policy are “blatantly anti-LGBTQ and perpetuate dangerous myths about sexual violence,” according to a post on the group’s Instagram, @wustudentsforchange.
Updates, as outlined in an email from Interim President George Hynd sent out to the campus community on Sep. 1, include changes that bring the policy up to date with guidance from the Biden administration and changes to the complaint resolution procedures in the Title IX investigative process.
“In the new procedures, all decision makers or appeal officers in the Title IX investigative process will be external to the university. Also, on-campus investigators will be selected from a pool of faculty and staff members who volunteer for the role and receive training from a law firm specializing in Title IX matters, including how to effectively investigate and report findings of an investigation,” Hynd wrote.
Following a March 2021 article published in The Johnsonian, many students felt that the process for sexual assault investigations laid out in this article were lackluster and harmful to victims. In response to campus unrest, which included two protests led by WU Students for Change, a new position dedicated solely to Title IX was created. Creating the Title IX Coordinator position removed these responsibilities from Vice President and Chief of Staff Kimberley Faust.
As of Sep. 1, a search committee, made up of student, faculty and staff representatives, has begun conducting initial interviews to fill the role.
While the creation of this position fulfills a demand from a petition created by WU Students for Change earlier in 2021, it was revealed that the Title IX Coordinator will still be reporting to Faust.
A job listing for the position on Inside Higher Ed for the Title IX Coordinator and ADA Compliance Officer states that the position reports to Winthrop’s Chief of Staff.
Ainsley McCarthy, a sophomore mass communication major and member of WU Students for Change, said upon hearing this she was angry and “above all insulted.”
“I mean they are operating as though they don’t think that we’re smart enough to figure this stuff out. Like we’re not going to realize that she’s still in charge. It doesn’t make the difference that it needs to make if she still has that power over what’s happening,” McCarthy said.
Drew Williams, a junior psychology major and member of WU Students for Change, said it seemed like the school was trying to avoid fixing the issue.
“I just felt like they tried to find a loophole that we wouldn’t realize. I was like ‘Really? Is this how you’re going to do this?’” Williams said.
Milo Wolverton, a senior English major and member of WU Students for Change, said ideally the Title IX Coordinator would not report to the Chief of Staff, but to an independent advisory committee.
“That way it’s not somebody who has a vested interest in the public image of the school. I think that’s the problem we’ve seen throughout this entire process is the…person who is in charge of Title IX had a vested interest in protecting the school. It’s insulting to think that they wouldn’t even reach out and ask students what they think would be actually fair,” Wolverton said.
WU Students for Change held a protest on Campus Green in March 2021 and a silent sit-in in April. McCarthy said that the president’s office reached out to the organization to meet with Hynd to discuss the issues at hand, but declined, instead requesting for a question-and-answer based town hall.
“What we had asked for too, is that instead they do a question and answer session with the president because we felt like a public question and answer session would actually give more students a chance to voice their concerns because we have a very diverse student body,” Wolverton said.
“They told us that we could send two representatives from our group [to meet with Hynd]. We declined because we said that there’s no way that just two of us can accurately represent the interest of the entirety of our campus. That is completely counterintuitive to what we’re trying to accomplish here,” McCarthy said.
Jade Jones, a senior finance major and member of WU Students for Change, said the organization will continue to keep its momentum by having more meetings and keeping the student body up to date on the issues.
“The way that we want to keep the pressure on is to continually have these meetings, continually release this information, put out these think pieces about what’s going on at this school and how it’s unethical and how it’s not helping either the school in the long run or the students in the long run. It’s just keeping our foot on Winthrop’s neck,” Jones said.
“We really want to drive home that they will be in a much worse place if they continue with their complacency as opposed to listening to the students, the people who have been hurt,” she said.
Wolverton said the biggest goal for the organization is keeping the university accountable.
“It is much deeper than people realize and it’s much deeper than Winthrop wants it to be. It’s just a matter of these people being held accountable,” he said.
