Kia Schwert

“‘as violated by the school as by my rapist’: Sexual Violence, Title IX and Purity Culture on Religious College Campuses”

Thesis Advisor: Karin Martin

Second Reader: Leela Fernandes

Abstract (click to expand)

In the wake of the #metoo and #times up movements, awareness of the prevalence and severity of sexual violence has permeated our national consciousness. In accordance with the organizational theory institutional isomorphism there was an observed variance in College and University responses to sexual violence on their campus. This current project seeks to first contextualize the case of sexual violence in Colleges and Universities within a larger discussion of what Civil Rights look like in a society that values Religious Freedom, ultimately aiming to understand the intersection of the two sectors and the position and responses of Religious Colleges and Universities that find themselves at this intersection. In order to do this the project is a historical legal analysis of Title IX, Religious Exemptions and Religious Colleges and Universities. The data for this project are the letters that the institutions drafted to the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) through the Department of Education, (DOE). The letters were then analysed. Some preliminary results that this project expects are an observable correlation of increased exemption requests as responses to the expansions of Title IX and the specific exemption requests. The additional result of this project is a relational database of all 250 institutions that currently have exemptions to Title IX. Along with Institutional names, demographic details are included such as denomination of religion and the State in which the University resides as well as the specific exemptions themselves. This is a significant contribution of the project because there is currently no searchable database that exists for the public. I hope to share the database with the general public so that prospective students of these universities can see this information regarding their prospective institutions.