*Editor’s note: This article previously inaccurately stated that NC State will not be changing sexual assault policy to reflect the “Yes Means Yes” standard of affirmative consent. No such decision has been made and a change is being discussed. The current policy language does state that consent is required for sexual conduct.
As the “Yes Means Yes” movement — whereby sexual conduct requires affirmative consent — sweeps the nation and many university policies, NC State has not yet changed its rules of conduct, but the possibility has not been ruled out as the faculty senate and other school administrators discuss the issue.
Various groups within the university have begun to discuss a change, but formal conversations about changing official policy have not occurred, according to Justine Hollingshead, assistant to the Vice Chancellor and Dean in the Division of Academic and Student Affairs.
Lisa Zapata, the Vice Provost for Student Development, Health and Wellness, said while the university has not yet decided to adopt the “Yes Means Yes” policy, it has also not yet decided against the policy and is currently looking to have more conversations about the topic in order to fully understand the effect it would have on the campus community.
“I think the most important voices that we want to hear from are the students, because they are so important in this and every policy that we have,” Zapata said.
In order to assure any decision to implement the policy stems from a campus-wide discussion, the university is in the process of having conversations with various groups, such as the Office of Student Conduct, legal affairs, the Counseling Center, the Women’s Center and Student Government.
“We want to get feedback and input from all facets of campus before we would make a decision,” Zapata said.
Hollingshead said, if the university were ready to formally adopt the new policy, it would need to go through various steps and entities, such as consideration from the General Council, and in the end, the NC State Board of Trustees would have to sign off on any Code of Conduct change.
While approval from the Board of Trustees is necessary to officially change the policy, Paul Cousins, the director of the Office of Student and Community Standards, said that is the last step in the entire process.
“In these kinds of situations, when you are talking about making both mechanical as well as fundamental philosophical shifts and advertising that publicly, there isn’t any way the Board of Trustees would want to review something that came to them without a broad base of support,” Cousins said. “Their job is to facilitate what is in the best interest of the whole community, so they are going to want to see the whole community supporting that kind of stuff.”
The “Yes Means Yes” model gained attention in California last month, when the state passed a law requiring campuses that receive state money to define consent as “affirmative, conscious, and voluntary agreement” to sexual activity. The law also specifies that consent must be continuous throughout sexual activities and excludes silence or incapacitation due to drugs or alcohol as consent.
State legislators in New Jersey and New Hampshire have introduced similar bills that link state funding to the use of affirmative consent, in hopes that the updated policy will reduce the number of sexual assaults on college campuses.
Many other schools around the country have added similar definitions to their sexual misconduct policies, including State University of New York schools and every Ivy League school, except Harvard University. More than 800 universities around the country currently have affirmative consent definitions in their sexual assault policies, according to The National Center for Higher Education Risk Management.
The current NC State policy includes a requirement of consent, however it does not explicitly define consent. It states: “‘Without consent’ means that an act was committed against a person either by force (threat, coercion, or intimidation), or without the person’s agreement or permission to allow another person to commit an act.”
It also states that, “A person who is incapacitated as a result of alcohol or drug consumption (voluntary or involuntary); who is unconscious, unaware, or asleep during the act; or who is under the legal age to provide consent, is incapable of giving consent.”
Though the NC State policy encapsulates many of the ideals behind the “Yes Means Yes” movement, a policy change could result in the university pursuing accused sexual predators differently.
That potential shift is why the policy is controversial to some and generating debate around the county. It’s also why university officials say any change deserves careful study and vetting.
“The main thing you have to consider when you start talking about ‘Yes Means Yes’ is that the burden of proof shifts to the respondent to prove that this person said yes, which is contrary to every sort of concept about justice that we currently have in the country,” Cousins said.
Otis McGresham, assistant director for Interpersonal Violence Services at the Women’s Center said most people at NC State understand that consent is a big part of preventing sexual violence.
“When you agree to the student code of conduct here, it is already implicit,” McGresham said. “For us, the challenge is creating a community that is less tolerant to sexual violence. We have to make it clear to perpetrators that that behavior is not tolerated.”
Ashley Simons-Rudolph, the director of the Women’s Center, said the Women’s Center already provides large-scale education about consent, including a peer education program, that seeks to have crucial conversations with students about how to talk about consent, and are led by either trained peer educators or by the professional staff of the Women’s Center.
“The best practices in the field are to have explicit conversations about consent,” Simons-Rudolph said. “Students feeling comfortable having those conversations, it’s a skill.”