In 2013, the Office for Civil Rights received 32 complaints about Title IX violations involving sexual violence against college students. The next year there were 102. By spring 2017, 319 investigations were pending.
Author Vanessa Grigoriadis views this spike as a sign of success, not overreach. In her remarkable new book “Blurred Lines: Rethinking Sex, Power and Consent on Campus,” the rising numbers are a sign that even on the most indifferent campuses, awareness of sexual assault is finally taking hold.
Naturally, others disagree. Chief among them is Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, who mournfully cited the same numbers as evidence of a “failed system” in a speech this month at George Mason University.