Title IX, under the current Trump administration, aims to make changes to the policies made in 2020.
While Ferris’ Title IX regulations have remained unchanged since 2020, Title IX underwent changes from the current Trump administration on the national level.
Changes include a narrow definition of sex discrimination, limited protections against sexual harassment and a narrow definition of hostile environment harassment.
Vice President of the Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance and pre-optometry senior Jamie Kocks gave her reaction to the recent changes.
“[Donald] Trump’s executive order only wants to recognize two sexes, male and female, which there’s not, there’s not just two genders,” Kocks said. “It’s extremely discriminatory, especially for people who don’t identify under those two and that’s extremely alarming, because now with the changes in policy like Title IX, they don’t have protections.”
One of the executive orders signed by the Trump administration involved the government only recognizing male and female genders.
The recent Title IX changes in definitions involve only sex assigned at birth, not including gender identity or sexual orientation. As for hostile environment harassment, unwelcome conduct is determined by a reasonable person to be so severe, pervasive and objectively offensive that it effectively denies a person equal access to the university’s education program or activity.
Title IX Coordinator Jessica Ettell Irvine elaborated on the topic of hostile environment harassment.
“We are trying to understand if something is severe, pervasive and objectively offensive, and how many times even after the first time someone said ‘I’m not interested’ did they persist?” Ettell Irvine said. “So we always have to ask those questions. We always have had to ask those questions even before 2020 to understand if whether or not the behaviors violating our policies under Title IX or if it’s violating other campus policies.”
Ettell Irvine explained why Ferris’ Title IX has remained unchanged is due to last summer in 2024 when the Biden administration released the new regulations. Multiple lawsuits started across the country, with different organizations taking issue with the new regulations and certain states. Certain institutions were called out for being enjoined, including Ferris, meaning that they could not implement these new policies.
Ferris’ Title IX has not changed aside from minor modifications on who to contact for certain things. Despite that, problems still arise on a national scale as a result of the Title IX changes. An issue that has been raised is the prohibition of transgender students from playing in school sports.
Ettell Irvine later discussed the in-depth reason why the administration is doing this.
“There’s this like push and pull around participation in certain athletics, because it’s a matter of what identities are protected under Title IX,” Ettell Irvine said. “So right now, the Trump administration is saying essentially that they’ll only recognize an identity based on what was assigned at birth. So with that they’re not recognizing folks that identify as transgender. Therefore you have to participate in the athletics that you would be associated with based on what was assigned to you at birth.”
The goal of Title IX is to protect people from being discriminated against based on their sex, gender identity and sexuality. With the Trump administration limiting this definition to just sex, it creates a problem for minority groups. Title IX does not just apply to males and females, it applies to everyone.
President of the FMLA and psychology senior Rayona Snowden expressed her concerns over what may result from these changes.
“As quickly as these gender rights, sex rights and women’s rights are getting removed and having control and like all these minorities, it all goes into play,” Snowden said. “Because if this can happen, what else can happen? Like how far back can we go? How much change can be reversed?”
As changes go into effect from the new administration that affects campus, the Torch will continue to report on them.