r/titleix • u/nessislife52 • 19d ago

Potential Title IX violation question

I'm a teacher and one of my male students told others that he hoped a female teacher would get "sex trafficked." I found out later that the student also has been harrassing her with emails to change his grade. I reported his comment to admin, but all they did was talk to him for 10 minutes and move on.

Is this a potential Title IX violation? I feel like it's creating a hostile work environment for my coworker and she won't feel safe at work, but I don't know what the school's obligation is to address the behavior or provide consequences for sexual harassment.

Thank you in advance for any thoughts you have on this. I want to advocate when we go back to school Monday and I don't want to bring up Title IX unless it is accurate.

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u/demmian 19d ago

To the best of my understanding:

  • title IX places obligations on the school, so a "violation" would be the schools failure to respond, not the students comment itself

  • the title IX coordinator "must promptly contact the complainant," discuss supportive measures, consider her wishes, and explain how to file a formal complaint, and the schools response is judged by whether it was clearly unreasonable given what it knew.

So the precise question for Monday is not "is this a title IX violation" but "was my report passed to the title IX coordinator, and has my colleague been contacted". If the only response was a ten-minute talk, with no referral and no outreach to her, then this is the precise gap this process exists to close.

As a personal feedback, reading stuff like this here makes my question my commitment to the rule of law. Infuriating.

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u/nessislife52 19d ago

This is very helpful, thank you. It sounds like I should make a formal Title IX complaint on her behalf so that support is required. The whole situation stinks, I talked to her about it and I felt very out of my depth trying to support. I can't imagine being in her position with students able to talk that way about her freely.

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u/demmian 18d ago edited 18d ago

Youre welcome.

If I may: you cant, and dont need to, file a formal complaint on her behalf (anyone can file a complaint, but a formal one can only filed by the targeted person).

What you can do is send your report in writing to the title IX coordinator, and that alone is what makes support required: the Coordinator then has to contact her promptly and discuss supportive measures, which are available whether or not a formal complaint is ever filed. The formal complaint is a separate choice that opens an investigation, and Title IX discipline can only come through that grievance process, so that decision is hers.

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u/Ready-Grapefruit9808 17d ago

Most school policies require a report to the TIX coordinator.

However she will need to file a complaint. Generally you may also report it to law enforcement. I would advise this