Today, June 23, 2026, marks the 54th anniversary of Title IX. For more than five decades, this landmark law has protected students from discrimination, advanced equity in education, and helped prevent sexual violence in our schools. This should be a day of celebration. Instead, it is a day shadowed by weakening protections and growing risks to student safety.
Recent changes shifting key responsibilities from the Department of Education (ED) to the Department of Justice (DOJ) will affect students in K-12 schools and colleges across the country. These changes will significantly weaken efforts to prevent sexual violence in schools, putting millions of students at risk.
The Sexual Violence Prevention Association (SVPA) is taking action on multiple fronts, calling on Congress, state lawmakers, and federal agencies to strengthen sexual violence prevention and education protections.
What Happened
The DOJ will now take on a greater role in enforcing civil rights for students under a new partnership with the Education Department. This agreement involves the ED’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR), the agency responsible for preventing and addressing discrimination and harassment in schools.
The full details of the agreement have not been made public. Education Department officials have said that many of OCR’s duties will now be carried out in partnership with the DOJ to create what they call a more “efficient” process. OCR will continue to lead investigations and make final decisions, but DOJ’s findings and investigations will now shape that work.
These changes are also likely to face legal challenges. Congress assigned many of these specific duties directly to ED. Moving them elsewhere raises real questions about legal authority and proper process, and parts of this plan may be challenged in court before it ever takes full effect.
Why This Matters
This is not the first time the administration has shifted ED’s responsibilities elsewhere. With this latest move, the department has now struck 14 agreements transferring its duties to other federal agencies. Taken together, these changes raise serious concerns that the administration intends to dismantle the Department of Education altogether, a goal first outlined in Project 2025 and reiterated in an executive order President Trump signed last March.
This shift comes after years of staffing cuts that have already left the OCR struggling. The office lost roughly half its staff in a reduction in force last year and was gutted of millions of dollars in funding, grants, and resources. A recent report found that OCR resolved only 1% of cases in 2025, the lowest number in over a decade. Investigations into sexual violence under Title IX have stalled, and complaints involving racial harassment and discriminatory discipline saw zero resolutions last year.
“Shifting an overwhelmed system into an unprecedented two-agency partnership will not solve the capacity crisis that this administration created. It will only deepen it,” said Omny Miranda Martone, Founder and CEO of the SVPA. “This latest move is part of an ongoing onslaught of attacks against safe and equitable education. It will weaken enforcement of prevention requirements, reduce accountability for negligent schools, and limit the paths to justice available to students.”
What Comes Next
Department officials have said their goal is to return education to the states. Whether or not that is the right path forward, it is now the reality students face. State laws matter more than ever. The SVPA’s State Scores and Policy Database track the protective and preventative laws in place for K-12 schools and higher education in every state. We encourage advocates, parents, and policymakers to use this tool to identify gaps and push for stronger protections where they live.
In addition to engaging with state lawmakers, the SVPA is proud to endorse the Title IX Anniversary Resolution, celebrating this landmark law and calling for continued action towards gender equity, sexual violence prevention, and education opportunities. We also stand with the Democratic Women’s Caucus in their letter demanding that the ED end baseless, politically motivated investigations, particularly those against trans+ students. Instead, the letter urges the department to resolve the backlog of pending OCR cases involving sexual assault and harassment. Finally, the SVPA is proud to endorse the Resolution to Impeach Education Secretary Linda McMahon for violating her oath of office and unlawfully transferring Department of Education programs to other federal agencies without the consent of Congress.
We are grateful to the National Women’s Law Center, It’s On Us, Know Your IX, End Rape On Campus, Every Voice Coalition, I Have The Right To, SafeBAE, SIECUS, and SSAIS for their long-standing leadership in defending Title IX and the students it protects.
“Students deserve unified protections, not frequent changes and unenforced promises,” said Martone. “We strongly urge state elected officials to pass laws in their community. It is now up to you to increase civil protections and prevent sexual violence against our students.”
