Glossary of Sexual Misconduct Terms

Campus Sexual Violence Elimination Act is an amendment to the Clery Act that requires higher education institutions to increase transparency about the scope of sexual violence on campus, guarantee victims enhanced rights, provide for standards in institutional conduct proceedings, and provide campus community-wide prevention educational programming.

Jeanne Clery Act is federal law that requires colleges and universities across the United States to disclose information about certain crime statistics on and around their campuses.

A person(s) alleging that they are the victim of sexual misconduct by another person subject to the District’s policy on sexual misconduct. The District or College shall also be considered a complainant if the District or College elects to investigate reports of potential violation(s) of the District’s policy on sexual misconduct. Any person(s), other than the alleged victim (complainant), who reports possible violation(s) of the District’s policy on sexual misconduct, shall be identified as a "reporter," as defined herein.

Consensual sexual activity requires an ongoing, affirmative consent, for the act in which the participants are involved. More specifically, affirmative consent means an expressed, affirmative, conscious, and voluntary agreement to engage in sexual activity. It is the responsibility of each person involved in the sexual activity to ensure that he or she has the affirmative consent of the other, or others, to engage the sexual activity. Lack of protest, or resistance, or silence does not mean consent.

There is no consent when there is force, expressed or implied, or when coercion, intimidation, threats, or duress is used to obtain consent. Affirmative consent must be ongoing throughout a sexual activity, and can be revoked at any time. The existence of a dating relationship between the persons involved, or the fact of past sexual relations between them, should never, by itself, be assumed to be an indicator of consent. If a person is mentally or physically incapacitated or impaired so that such person cannot understand the fact, nature, or extent of the sexual situation, there is no consent; this includes impairment or incapacitation due to alcohol or drug consumption, or being asleep or unconscious.

The use of physical violence, coercion, threats, intimidation, isolation, or stalking of another while in a dating relationship, or a social relationship which is of romantic or sexually intimate nature. Such violence may include other forms of emotional, sexual or economic abuse directed towards a person who is or has been in a dating relationship, or a social relationship of a romantic or sexually intimate nature, with the victim. This includes any behaviors that intimidate, manipulate, humiliate, isolate, frighten, terrorize, coerce, threaten, blame, hurt, injure, or wound someone. Dating violence can be a single act or a pattern of behavior in relationships.

Guidance issued by the Office for Civil Rights on April 4, 2011 to assist colleges and universities with meeting their obligations under Title IX and to provide members of the public with information about their rights.

Any employee, contractor, student, member of the public, or invitee present on District property, or on property being used by the District. For purposes of this definition, a student is deemed a member of the District Community while enrolled in, or in the process of applying for, enrollment as a student at any of the colleges within the District.

The use of physical violence, coercion, threats, intimidation, isolation, stalking, or other forms of emotional, sexual, or economic abuse directed towards (a) a current or former spouse or intimate partner; (b) a person with whom one shares a child; or (c) anyone who is protected from the Respondent’s acts under the domestic or family violence laws of California, including Family Code Section 6250 et seq., and any applicable federal law, including the Violence Against Women Act of 1994 (VAWA), as amended. This can include behaviors that intimidate, manipulate, humiliate, isolate, frighten, terrorize, coerce, threaten, blame, hurt, injure, or wound someone. Domestic violence can be a single act or a pattern of behavior in relationships.

Unwelcome Conduct of a nonsexual nature based on a student’s actual or perceived gender, including conduct based on gender identity, gender expression, or nonconformity with gender stereotypes.

Exists when unwelcome conduct of a sexual or gender-based type is sufficiently serious and/or pervasive to deny or limit a person’s ability to fully participate in or benefit from the College’s programs or activities. A Hostile Environment can be created by anyone involved in the College’s program or activity (e.g., administrators, faculty members, staff, students, or campus visitors). In determining whether conduct has created a hostile environment, the District considers the conduct in question from both objective and subjective perspectives. The District will base findings on a variety of factors, including the severity, persistence, or pervasiveness of the conduct. The more severe the conduct, the less need there is to show a repetitive series of incidents to find a hostile environment. Likewise, a series of incidents may be sufficient even if the conduct is not particularly severe.

Individuals who identify as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer/Questioning

Individuals mandated to report violations that involve minors (all college employees).

Based on the applicable evidence collected during the investigation, it is more likely than not that the student did not commit a violation.

Office for Civil Rights, whose mission is to ensure equal access to education and to promote educational excellence throughout the nation through vigorous enforcement of civil rights.

Either the complainant or the Respondent, involved in the alleged violation of sexual misconduct. The term "parties" means both the complainant and the respondent collectively.

Any person(s), other than the complainant, who reports potential violation(s) of the District’s policy on sexual misconduct.

A person or persons who are alleged to have violated the District’s policy on sexual misconduct.

Means, based on the applicable evidence collected during the investigation, it is more likely than not the student committed one or more violation(s) of the District’s policy or regulation on sexual misconduct.

College employees responsible (mandated) for reporting sexual misconduct violations. These individuals include managers, club advisors, coaches, and law enforcement.

Any act of reprisal against a person who is involved in an allegation of sexual misconduct including but not limited to the complainant, the respondent, witnesses, investigators, and hearing panel, or appeal committee. Examples of actions that might be Retaliation against a complainant, witness, or other participant in the complaint process include: (a) singling the person out for harsher treatment; (b) lowering a grade or evaluation, failing to hire, failing to promote, withholding pay increase, demotion, or discharge; or (d) providing negative information about the person in order to interfere with his or her prospects for employment, admission, or academic program.

Those disciplinary measures available to the College Disciplinary Officer or designee to impose upon a student upon the finding of the student’s responsibility for violation(s) of the Rules for Student Conduct or of the Sexual Misconduct Policy.

For purposes of this administrative procedure, sex may refer to gender designation as male or female or based upon a perceived association with a particular gender; or to a physical act of a sexual nature.

Actual or attempted sexual contact with another person without that person’s consent. Sexual Assault includes, but is not limited to:

• Intentional touching of another person’s body in a sexual nature without that person’s consent;
• Other intentional sexual contact with another person without that person’s consent;
• Coercing, forcing, or attempting to coerce or force a person to touch another person’s body in a sexual nature without that person’s consent; or
• Rape, which is penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina, or anus of a person by anybody part of another person, or by an object, or the mouth of a person, or by a sex organ of another person, without the other person’s consent.

Occurs when a person takes sexual advantage of another person for the benefit of anyone other than that person without the other person’s consent. Examples of behavior that could rise to the level of sexual exploitation include:

• Prostituting another person
• Recording images (e.g. video, photograph) or audio of another person’s sexual activity, body when recorded for a sexual reason, or nakedness without that person’s consent
• Disturbing images (e.g. video, photograph) or audio of another person’s sexual activity, images of a another person's body for sexual purposes, or nakedness, if the individual distributing the images or audio knows or should have known that the person depicted in the images or audio did not consent to such disclosure and objects to such disclosure;
• Viewing or distributing images of an individual's sexual activity, of another person's body parts, or nakedness in a place where that person would have a reasonable expectation of privacy, without that person’s consent, to have the image shared, or advance consent to view such an image, for the purposes of arousing or gratifying sexual desire.

Unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature, including but not limited to unwelcome sexual advances; requests for sexual favors; or other verbal or nonverbal conduct of a sexual nature, including rape, sexual assault, and sexual exploitation. In addition, depending on the facts, dating violence, domestic violence, and stalking may also be forms of sexual harassment.

Comprises a broad range of unwelcome behaviors focused on sex and/or gender that may or may not be sexual in nature. Any intercourse or other intentional sexual touching or activity without the other person’s consent is sexual assault, and is a form of sexual misconduct under the District's Sexual Misconduct Policy. sexual misconduct encompasses sexual harassment, sexual assault, sexual exploitation, or gender-based harassment, which is a form of harassment based on gender identity, gender expression, or non-conformity with gender stereotypes. sexual misconduct may also encompass acts of asexual nature, including acts of sexual stalking, domestic violence, dating violence, intimidation, or retaliation, following an incident where alleged sexual misconduct has occurred.

Sexual misconduct can occur between strangers or acquaintances, or people who know each other well, including between people involved in an intimate or sexual relationship. It can be committed by anyone regardless of gender identity, and can occur between people of the same or of a different sex or gender.

Behavior in which a student repeatedly engages in a course of conduct directed at another person and makes a credible threat with the intent to place that person in reasonable fear for his or her safety, or the safety of his or her family; where the threat is reasonably determined by the College Disciplinary Officer to create substantial emotional distress, torment, create fear, or terrorize the person.

Course of conduct directed at a specific person that would cause a reasonable person to feel fear or suffer substantial emotional distress due to another’s sexual interest or gender interest. Sexual stalking involves repeated and continued harassment of a sexual or gender-based nature, against the expressed consent of another individual, which causes the targeted individual to feel emotional distress, including fear or apprehension. Such sexual stalking behaviors may include pursuing or following; unwanted communication or contact— including face-to-face encounters, telephone calls, voice messages, electronic messages, web-based messages, text messages, unwanted gifts, trespassing; and surveillance or other types of observation.

The designated person(s) responsible for oversight and implementation of Title IX compliance and for the effective oversight of the District’s Sexual Misconduct Policy and Procedures.

Person(s) responsible for assisting in the oversight and implementation of Title IX compliance for the effective oversight of the District’s Sexual Misconduct Policy and Procedures. Title IX Deputies are specific managers located in Academic Affairs, Athletics, Human Resources, and Student Affairs. Also serves as the The Title IX Coordinator’s designated person(s) responsible for the investigation of complaints of sexual misconduct and for the intake of complaints of sexual harassment against district employees.

Conduct of a sexual, gender-based, or harassing nature, which is not solicited, invited, or consented to. Such conduct would be deemed unwelcome if the person receiving it did not request or invite it, and considered the conduct to be undesired, or offensive. Such conduct may take various forms, including name-calling, graphic or written statements (including the use of cell phones or the Internet), hazing, bullying, offensive, or other conduct that may be physically or psychologically threatening, harmful, or humiliating. Unwelcome conduct does not have to include intent to harm be directed at a specific target, or involve repeated incidents. Unwelcome conduct can involve persons of the same or opposite sex. Participation in the conduct or the other party’s failure to complain does not mean that the conduct was welcome.

The Violence Against Women Act; meant to improve the criminal justice response to violence against women.

No tolerance and refusal to accept undesirable conduct and behavior, typically by strict and uncompromising application of the law.