Nearly a year ago, Gov. Jerry Brown of California signed a law requiring the state’s colleges and universities to adopt an “affirmative consent” standard defining that “only yes means yes” — that students engaging in sexual activity must signal they are willingly doing so.
Now other states are making — or at least weighing — similar moves. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York signed a law this month requiring affirmative consent on college campuses, and advocates of the practice say it is likely to spread elsewhere. The momentum is a sign that lawmakers and colleges continue to sharpen their focus on thwarting campus sexual assault while encouraging students to report attacks.
What happens when a state decides that only yes means yes? We took a look at the impact of California’s law and what New York institutions can expect under their new law.
How did California’s “yes means yes” law affect the state’s colleges?
The California law applies to all colleges and universities that receive state funding. And for most of those institutions, the enactment of the law last September didn’t make much of a splash. That’s because so many institutions already had affirmative-consent language written into their policies on sexual assault. The University of California system, for example, adopted the yes-means-yes standard in February 2014.
Occidental College started using the standard four years ago, says Ruth Jones, the college’s Title IX coordinator. She says that most cases her office has handled have centered on incapacitation by drugs or alcohol, which negates the ability to consent to sexual activity, instead of questions of affirmative consent.
Whether a student will report an assault depends on factors beyond a consent policy, Ms. Jones says.
“People have different concerns: who will know about it, and whether or not the process will interfere with their ability to pursue their education,” she says. “For respondents, they’re concerned about if they have a fair opportunity to tell their story.”
Are there any ways in which the law has made an impact on the ground?
Here’s one. Even though it didn’t change their day-to-day operations, several Title IX coordinators at California institutions agree that the law has increased awareness of sexual-assault issues, and not just among students.
“It was national news and was an opportunity for this conversation to go beyond the gates of our community,” says Ms. Jones, adding that many students started discussing the law at home with their families.
Kathleen Salvaty, the Title IX coordinator at the University of California at Los Angeles, says she has noticed a “high level” of interest from students in the topic of consent since she started work at the university last spring. That was particularly evident during UCLA’s freshman-orientation sessions this summer, she says.
“I was impressed by their understanding, and it was clear that it was something they had thought about,” she says.
If colleges are already stating that yes means yes, why pass a state-level affirmative-consent law?
Advocates and Title IX coordinators say one benefit of codifying the language in state law is that it sends a clear signal to college students: This issue matters.
On a symbolic level, the concept of affirmative consent “shifts the onus from the victim to the alleged perpetrator to demonstrate that the person had consent,” says Colby Bruno, senior legal counsel at the Victim Rights Law Center, in Boston.
“That’s a positive step. I think even as a society we wait for the victim to say, ‘This is what happened, this is the story, this is the truth.’ And the assailant says, ‘Oh no, that’s not what happened,’” Ms. Bruno says.
Daren Mooko, associate dean and Title IX coordinator at Pomona College, says he’s seen an increase in reports of sexual assault since the college adopted a “yes means yes” policy, in 2013, a sign students may be more aware of the resources and steps to report than before.
He also attributes the increase to broader attention to the topic of sexual assault and the involvement of student leaders in educating their peers about prevention, which has led to “a culture of people feeling more open” and a “significant increase in reports.”
What should colleges in New York expect?
Probably business as usual. Many New York colleges already have a “yes means yes” standard, including the 64-campus State University of New York system, which adopted such a policy in October 2014. As in California, the law applies to public and private colleges.
Chantelle Cleary, the Title IX coordinator at the University at Albany, one SUNY campus, says the state law is simply a more “succinct” version of the language already in the institution’s policy. “The definition and the idea we are trying to teach our students hasn’t changed. It’s more of a language thing,” she says.
Officials at Fordham University are taking another look at their existing policies following enactment of the state law. The institution decided last year to add a written definition of consent to its policy, says Anastasia Coleman, its Title IX coordinator. The university has also incorporated the concept of affirmative consent into orientation programs for the last several years, she says.
In light of the law, she says, campus officials are likely to make additional updates. “We evaluate our policy and orientation training every year, taking into consideration changes in the law, feedback from the previous year, and looking for ways to improve our policy,” she says.
Will campus affirmative-consent laws spread to other states?
Most likely. Ms. Bruno, of the Victim Rights Law Center, says she expects more states to adopt similar standards. But those states may try to be “a bit more cautious,” she adds. “They want to see what these new laws do,” she says. “Are they effective in prevention? Are people being accused and found responsible more often than not?”
A policy requiring students to express consent through “clear and unambiguous language” had been set to take effect this month across the five campuses of the University of Minnesota system. But Eric W. Kaler, the system’s president, recently delayed a vote on the change to give members of the university’s Board of Regents more time to review the concept before they meet again this fall, the Star Tribune reported.
Campus officials shouldn’t rush into a new policy just to jump on a trend, Ms. Bruno says. Rather, she says, colleges should consider commissioning campus-climate surveys before changing policies, to better understand if a new standard would make a difference. And once new guidelines are in place, institutions face the challenge of properly training their staffs, educating their students, and carrying out the new standards.
“You can have the best policy in the world,” Ms. Bruno says, “and have terrible implementation.”
