This Week in FIRE News

As most Torch readers know, in April of this year, the United States Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (OCR) established new mandates requiring colleges and universities receiving federal funding to dramatically reduce students' due process rights. Under the new regulations, colleges and universities must employ a "preponderance of the evidence" standard—a 50.01%, "more likely than not" evidentiary burden—when adjudicating student complaints concerning sexual harassment or sexual violence. Back in May, FIRE sent an open letter to OCR, sharply criticizing the agency's new requirements, and we have been promoting these criticisms in the blog and through media coverage ever since.

Today, we released a survey of standards of evidence used by the nation's top colleges and universities in an effort to gauge the impact of the new OCR requirements. Be sure to check out our survey in its entirety, and to stay tuned for further news on the impacts of OCR's mandate next week.

Here's a look at where this new mandate, and other campus due process and free speech issues, were captured in the media this week:

On OCR's new mandate:

• Inside Higher Ed: An Open Letter to OCR (a must-read)
• The Daily Campus: New sexual assault mandate causes national controversy
• OpenMarket.org: Senate Bill Would Further Undermine Due Process on Campus

On UCSB's lies about viewpoint discrimination against College Republicans:

• FrontPage Magazine: 'San Francisco Chronicle' Reprints UCSB's Lies about Viewpoint Discrimination against Horowitz Event

On the due process victory for a student at University of North Dakota:

• WDAY News 6: Wrongly Accused UND Student Will Not Return To UND
• Say Anything Blog: UND May Get Sued Over Wrongfully Treating Student Like A Criminal
• Say Anything Blog: Two Years Later The University Of North Dakota Finally Gives Falsely Accused Student Justice

On "yellow light" speech codes at San Diego State University:

• The Daily Aztec: SDSU abuse policies under FIRE

On CVCC student Marc Bechtol's Facebook case:

• National Review Online: Back To School, Again
• The College Fix: Student expelled for Facebook post returns to class

On the professor who took a box cutter to a free speech wall at Sam Houston State University:

• The Chronicle of Higher Education: University's Proposed Social-Media Policy Draws Cries of Censorship