2024年，人们在纽约伊萨卡的康奈尔大学校园内行走。（ 校必须展开调查并采取措施保护相关学生。
People walk on the campus of Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., in 2024. Seth Wenig/AP When colleges receive reports of sexual assault on a student, a federal law dating back to 1972 is supposed to ensure that they investigate, and take steps to protect those students. It's called Title IX, and it's aimed at prohibiting discrimination in schools based on sex.
这项法律被称为《第九条》（Title IX），旨在禁止学校中基于性别的歧视行为。该法律规定，高校必须为所有学生提供安全的校园环境，并确保性暴力不会妨碍学生平等接受教育的机会。
The law says a university must allow all students to have a safe campus environment, and that sexual violence doesn't hinder a student's equal access to an education.
这起诉讼涉及一名前康奈尔大学学生（化名“Jane Doe”）的遭遇：她声称自己在2024年10月被一个兄弟会成员团伙下药并遭到强奸。校园警察对此事件进行了调查，并将案件移交给了当地地方检察官。尽管调查最终没有提出刑事指控，但该学生的举报还是触发了康奈尔大学依据《第九条》展开的内部调查程序。
It's supposed to offer students protection in cases such as the one at issue in the lawsuit by a former Cornell University student, referred to as Jane Doe. The lawsuit claims that she was drugged and raped by seven students at a fraternity house in October 2024. The campus police investigated the incident and referred the case to the local district attorney. Though no criminal charges resulted from that investigation, the student's report triggered the campus Title IX process at Cornell.
诉讼文件显示，截至2025年5月，至少有12次听证会在由教职员工组成的小组中举行。康奈尔大学在一份声明中表示，其调查工作耗时“数月”。调查结果导致多名涉事学生被开除或停学；涉事的兄弟会分会也在2024年被关闭，并被禁止进入校园。
The lawsuit states that in May 2025, at least 12 hearings were held before a panel of faculty and staff. Cornell said in a statement that its investigation took "several months." As a result, the university said there were expulsions and suspensions, and the fraternity chapter involved "was closed in 2024 and remains barred from campus."
曾在美国教育部民权办公室工作了近二十年的Beth Gellman-Beer解释说：“在《第九条》框架下，学校的作用是判断被指控性侵的人是否应该继续留在校园内；而刑事程序则负责追究法律责任。”
A path for complaints by students Title IX investigations can work in parallel with a criminal investigation, explains Beth Gellman-Beer, who spent nearly two decades at the U.S. Education Department's Office for Civil Rights. "The school's role in Title IX, as opposed to criminal proceedings, is to determine whether or not the person accused of this sexual assault should remain on campus," she says.
学校无权决定某人是否应该被送进监狱；学校的责任是营造一个安全、包容的环境，确保所有学生都能接受教育。Gellman-Beer指出，《第九条》（Title IX）规定的举证标准比刑事案件要低，因此如果检察官没有提起诉讼，学生也可以通过《第九条》来寻求正义。
Schools are not determining if somebody is going to go to jail. The school's responsibility is to ensure a safe and inclusive environment where all students have access to the educational environment." Title IX sets a lower burden of proof than a criminal case, and it can be another route for a student to seek justice if prosecutors don't end up picking up the case, Gellman-Beer adds.
根据所调查事件的严重程度，《第九条》规定的处理措施可能包括：对涉事学生进行停学或开除处分；为受害学生提供不同的住宿安排；下达“禁止接触”命令；或者调整工作时间表，以避免受害学生与施害者同时在工作场所工作。
Depending on the severity of the incident being investigated, Title IX outcomes can include, in addition to suspension or expulsion for the accused, steps like providing a student victim with different housing, establishing a "no-contact" order, or creating a work schedule so that student victim and perpetrator don't work at the same time.
Gellman-Beer表示，这些措施的目的是为了帮助受害者继续正常上课。
The goal, Gellman-Beer says, is to provide support to the victims so that they can still go to class.
《第九条》的修订：近年来，《第九条》的实施方式发生了重大变化。2020年，特朗普政府提高了举证标准，并要求学校必须进行“包含交叉询问的现场听证会”；而拜登政府则试图扩大《第九条》的保护范围，为LGBTQ学生提供更多保护，并取消了听证会的强制要求（批评者认为这一规定会抑制学生报告侵权行为的积极性）。本周，特朗普政府又撤销了这些修改措施，恢复了2020年版本的法律规定。
Changes to Title IX In recent years there have been big changes to how Title IX is implemented. In 2020, the Trump administration raised the burden of proof – and also required schools to conduct "live hearings with cross-examinations" – among other changes. The Biden Administration sought to expand Title IX by including protection for LGBTQ students and by removing the requirement for hearings, as critics charged that it stifled students' willingness to report incidents. The Trump administration this week overturned those additional protections and reverted to the 2020 version of the law.
这种反复的变动在高校中引发了关于《第九条》及其实施方式的困惑。
The back and forth has created confusion at colleges about Title IX and how they should implement it.
“这一法律程序往往存在缺陷，”曾代表性侵案件受害者的律师Carolin Guentert说道。
"It's often a flawed process," says Carolin Guentert, a lawyer who has represented victims in Title IX cases involving sexual assault allegations.
“《第九条》协调员或负责调查此类情况的人员缺乏专业培训，且并不总是具备创伤知情意识，”她表示。“法规变化迅速，学校的政策必须跟上步伐。”她说，这可能导致调查人员“与所在学校的政策脱节”。“无处不在，时刻都在发生。”与此同时，大学校园内的性侵犯问题依然严峻。
"Title IX coordinators or individuals tasked with investigating these kinds of situations don't have the proper training, and are not always trauma-informed," she says. "The regulations are changing so quickly and schools' policies have to keep up." She says that can lead to an investigator being "out of step with their own schools' policies 'Everywhere, all the time' Meanwhile, sexual assault on college campuses remains a major problem.
“我听到很多人说：‘这种事怎么会发生在如此精英的院校？’”根特尔特（Guentert）说。“而真正的答案是，这种事无处不在，时刻都在发生。”在康奈尔大学，2025年的一项调查发现，超过三分之一的本科女生报告称，在校期间曾经历过性侵犯，这一比例高于2023年的23%。
"I hear a lot of people talking about, 'How could this happen at such an elite institution?'" says Guentert. "And really the answer is, this happens everywhere, all the time." At Cornell, a 2025 survey found that more than 1 in 3 undergraduate women reported experiencing a sexual assault at some point during their time there, up from 23% in 2023.
该校成立了一个工作组，就如何遏制校园性暴力提出建议——其中包括提高对性知识的了解，以及制定学校特定的举报行为流程。
The school created a task force t o make recommendations on how to curb sexual violence on campus – which included increased knowledge about sex and school-specific processes for reporting behavoir.
历史上，如果学生认为其所在大学未能履行《第九条》规定的保护义务，可以向美国教育部民权办公室（OCR）提出投诉，这将触发调查。
Historically, a student who believes their college has failed to protect them, by not upholding Title IX, could file a complaint with the Education Department's Office of Civil Rights (OCR), which would trigger an investigation.
在试图废除教育部的过程中，特朗普政府大幅削减了该办公室的职能，并将其许多律师转移至司法部。
In its efforts to eliminate the Education Department, the Trump administration has drastically cut back that office, transferring many of its lawyers to the Justice Department.
该政府还将《第九条》的执行重点更多地集中在性别认同和跨性别运动员政策上。
The administration has also focused its Title IX enforcement much more heavily on gender identity and transgender athletic policies.
根据佛蒙特州独立参议员伯尼·桑德斯（Bernie Sanders）近期发布的一份报告，2025年，民权办公室未就任何涉及校园性骚扰或性暴力的重大歧视案件达成和解协议。
In 2025 OCR didn't reach any resolution agreements for major discrimination cases involving sexual harassment or sexual violence on campus, according to a recent report from Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.