We are advocating for changes in four main areas: in a survivor bill of rights, in university procedures, in funding, hiring and promotion processes, and in conferences. Our focus is limited to those ways in which graduate and professional student interests raise issues separate from the ones undergraduates face.

The following positions are very much a discussion in progress; we welcome contributions and thoughts.

Survivor Bill of Rights

Universities ought to have a visibly posted survivor bill of rights. Important considerations include:

  • privacy, with particular regard towards a survivor's counseling and medical records (which at many places currently may be used against them)
  • policies to safeguard against professional retaliation
  • compensation for the survivor's lost research time/funding from the university housing the assailant, contingent upon the specific circumstances of the case

University Procedures and Policies

We advocate for:

  • a graduate and professional student-specific Title IX coordinator housed outside of the Graduate School, which is too frequently associated with graduate students' funding
  • a permanent investigator for cases, separate from the Title IX coordinator
  • coverage of consent, particularly within the context of graduate/professional school, during student orientation
  • improving faculty awareness of the issues of consent, particularly in regards to hierarchical workplaces
  • a publicly posted, digitally available, visible single document for graduate and professional students listing the resources, university hearing procedures, and legal options available to them if they have been sexually harassed or assaulted
  • clear and accessible policies detailing options and possible outcomes through the entirety of the complaint process
  • a hearing panel for all cases, whether involving an undergraduate, graduate or professional student, staff, or faculty, to give recommendations for findings and sanctions. In cases involving graduate or professional students, the panel would ideally include at least one graduate or professional student and emphatically exclude any member of the graduate or professional student's program or department
  • university accountability as regards the handling of both complaints and formal cases
  • banning romantic and sexual contact between faculty and students within a supervisory context, given our increasing awareness of the systemic potential for abuse

Funding, Hiring and Promotion

We strongly urge universities to:

  • adopt policies against penalizing students for bringing forward cases
  • formally ban consideration of a candidate's history of survivorship or activism on matters of sexual harassment and assault during deliberations on hiring, promotion or tenure

Conferences

We ask conference, panel, and lecture series organizers to consider:

  • publishing, promoting and enforcing a harassment policy or code of conduct with reporting options and consequences for violations
  • deterring the attendance of known harassers

In addition, we ask that conferences hosted by American universities abide by the same Title IX civil rights considerations as those universities.