Students Accused Under Title IX: A Checklist of the Process and Your Rights in It

A student named as the respondent in a Title IX complaint has a defined set of procedural rights under the federal regulations: written notice, a presumption of non-responsibility, an advisor, access to the evidence, a decision-maker who is not the investigator, and an appeal.^{[8][2][4][9][10][11]} The same regulations also bind the respondent, including through the ban on retaliation.^[5]

This checklist follows the process in order and states only what the regulation in force says. A school's own policy can add detail, so the policy and the notice letter are the documents to read alongside it. Nothing here assumes an allegation is true or false, and it is not advice about any case.

Which rule applies: on September 29, 2026 the U.S. Department of Education published a final rule, effective the same day, repealing its 2024 Title IX rule and restoring the regulatory text that existed before the 2024 rulemaking.^[1] Materials written for the 2024 rule describe procedures that are not in force.

1. Read the written notice

On receiving a formal complaint the school must give the known parties written notice of the allegations, with sufficient details known at the time and with sufficient time to prepare a response before any initial interview. Sufficient details include the identities of the parties, the conduct alleged, and the date and location of the alleged incident, if known.^[8] The process must include a presumption that the respondent is not responsible until a determination is made at its conclusion.^[2]

Points to check in the notice and the policy:

• Whether the conduct alleged falls within the regulation's definition of sexual harassment, which has three parts, including sexual assault as defined in federal statute.^[12]
• Whether the school says the conduct occurred in its education program or activity, which includes locations and events over which the school exercised substantial control over both the respondent and the context, and buildings of officially recognized student organizations.^[13]
• Which standard of evidence the school uses. It must state whether it is the preponderance of the evidence standard or the clear and convincing evidence standard.^[14]

If the conduct would not meet the definition even if proved, did not occur in the school's program or activity, or did not occur against a person in the United States, the school must dismiss the formal complaint for Title IX purposes, but that does not preclude action under another provision of its code of conduct.^[15]

2. Understand interim measures and what they are

A school must follow its grievance process before imposing any disciplinary sanction on a respondent.^[13] In the meantime it may provide supportive measures, which are non-disciplinary, non-punitive individualized services available to the complainant or the respondent; the examples include mutual restrictions on contact between the parties, schedule changes and housing changes.^[12]

Emergency removal is separate. It requires an individualized safety and risk analysis, a determination that an immediate threat to the physical health or safety of a student or other individual arising from the allegations justifies removal, and notice and an opportunity to challenge the decision immediately following the removal.^[16]

A school's contact restriction is a supportive measure, not a court order; a personal protection order (PPO) is an injunctive order of the circuit court.^[17] Either or both may be in place, and a criminal court can add its own no-contact release condition.^[18] See Sexual assault PPOs.

3. Choose an advisor

Each party may be accompanied to any related meeting or proceeding by the advisor of their choice, who may be, but is not required to be, an attorney. The school may limit the extent of advisors' participation if the limits apply equally to both parties.^[4] If a party does not have an advisor present at a college live hearing, the school must provide one without fee or charge, of the school's choice, to conduct cross-examination on that party's behalf.^[19]

The federal Clery Act separately requires that accuser and accused have the same opportunities to have others present at an institutional disciplinary proceeding, including an advisor of their choice.^[20] Finding a lawyer is covered in Do you need a lawyer before charges are filed?

4. Know the evidence rules

• The burden of proof and the burden of gathering evidence rest on the school and not on the parties.^[3]
• The school cannot access, consider, disclose or use a party's treatment records made by a physician, psychiatrist, psychologist or similar professional without that party's voluntary, written consent.^[3]
• The process may not require, allow or use questions or evidence that seek information protected under a legally recognized privilege unless the holder has waived it.^[21]
• Before the investigative report is completed, the parties must have at least 10 days to submit a written response to the evidence, and the report must be sent at least 10 days before a hearing or other time of determination.^[9]
• Questions and evidence about the complainant's sexual predisposition or prior sexual behavior are not relevant, with two exceptions the regulation states.^[19]

One provision needs careful reading. In listing what a school must do when investigating, 34 CFR 106.45(b)(5)(iii) says the school must "not restrict the ability of either party to discuss the allegations under investigation or to gather and present relevant evidence."^[22] That sentence is addressed to the school and restricts the school. It says nothing that authorizes a respondent, or anyone acting for a respondent, to contact the complainant or a witness.^[22] Beside it stands the retaliation rule, 34 CFR 106.71, under which no school "or other person" may intimidate, threaten, coerce, or discriminate against any individual because the individual made a report or complaint or participated in the process.^[5] A contact restriction imposed as a supportive measure, a court's no-contact condition and Michigan's witness statute each apply by their own terms as well.^[12][18][23]

Under MCL 750.483a(5)(a), a person shall not knowingly and intentionally remove, alter, conceal, destroy, or otherwise tamper with evidence to be offered in a present or future official proceeding; a violation is a felony.^[24] Keeping messages, images, accounts and devices exactly as they are is none of those acts.

5. Prepare for the hearing, or for written questions

Colleges and universities. The grievance process must provide for a live hearing at which each party's advisor may ask the other party and any witnesses all relevant questions and follow-up questions, including those challenging credibility. Cross-examination is conducted directly, orally and in real time by the advisor and never by a party personally.^[19] At the request of either party the hearing must take place with the parties in separate rooms connected by technology, and the school must create a recording or transcript and make it available to the parties.^[19]

Elementary and secondary schools. The process may, but need not, provide for a hearing. With or without one, each party must be allowed to submit written, relevant questions for any party or witness, receive the answers, and ask limited follow-up questions before a determination.^[25] Michigan's separate expulsion statutes are covered in K-12 school discipline for sexual misconduct.

The decision-maker cannot be the same person as the Title IX Coordinator or the investigator and must issue a written determination regarding responsibility.^[10]

6. Know the options after the decision, and informal resolution

A school must offer both parties an appeal from a determination or a dismissal on three bases: procedural irregularity that affected the outcome; new evidence that was not reasonably available earlier and could affect the outcome; and a conflict of interest or bias on the part of the Title IX Coordinator, investigator or decision-maker that affected the outcome.^[11]

Informal resolution, such as mediation, is voluntary. A school may not require it, may offer it only after a formal complaint is filed, and needs the parties' voluntary, written consent.^[26] Any party may withdraw before agreeing to a resolution and resume the grievance process, and informal resolution is not available for an allegation that an employee sexually harassed a student.^[27]

7. The rules that bind the accused student

Retaliation. No school or other person may intimidate, threaten, coerce, or discriminate against any individual for the purpose of interfering with a right under Title IX, or because the individual made a report or complaint, testified, assisted, or participated or refused to participate in an investigation, proceeding or hearing.^[5] The words "or other person" mean the rule is not limited to the school.

False statements. A school may charge a person with a code-of-conduct violation for making a materially false statement in bad faith in a grievance proceeding. The same provision says a determination regarding responsibility, alone, is not sufficient to conclude that any party made a materially false statement in bad faith.^[28]

Michigan criminal law. Michigan's witness statute applies whether or not an official proceeding is pending, if the person knows or has reason to know that the other person could be a witness at any official proceeding.^[23] It prohibits giving or promising anything of value, or using threat or intimidation, to discourage or influence testimony, and willfully interfering with a witness's ability to attend, testify or provide information.^[29][30][31] Retaliating against a person for having reported a crime, as that statute defines retaliation, is a separate offense.^[32] Nothing in the Title IX regulation refers to these statutes or creates an exception to them. These rules are set out in Ten mistakes that make an investigation worse.

8. If police are, or may become, involved

The regulation contemplates a school process running while police are involved: it lists concurrent law enforcement activity as an example of what may be good cause for a temporary delay or limited extension, with written notice to both parties.^[7] Its text speaks only of a temporary delay and a limited extension; it says nothing about a stay until a criminal case ends.^[7]

What the regulation says, and does not say, about a respondent's statements:

• The September 2026 rule did not reinstate the earlier sentence that barred a decision-maker from relying on statements of a person who did not submit to cross-examination and from drawing an inference based solely on a party's absence or refusal to answer.^[33] The current hearing paragraph contains neither rule.^[6]
• A school must keep records of each investigation, including any hearing recording or transcript, for seven years.^[34]
• Under the Michigan Rules of Evidence, a party's own statement offered against that party is not hearsay.^[35]

The regulation and the Michigan statutes reviewed for this guide do not address whether a respondent can decline to answer in a school process on Fifth Amendment grounds, what a school may conclude from silence, or how a prosecutor may obtain or use statements made there. Those are questions for a lawyer. The overlap is examined further in Title IX and criminal charges at the same time, and the rights that apply to police questioning are in Accused of a sex offense: first steps.

What people commonly get wrong

"The school has to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt." The school chooses between the preponderance of the evidence standard and the clear and convincing evidence standard and must state which it uses.^[14]

"I have to prove I did not do it." The burden of proof and of gathering evidence is on the school.^[3]

"A finding by the school is a criminal record." The regulation calls the outcome a "determination regarding responsibility" and nowhere calls it a conviction.^[10] A school applies the preponderance or the clear and convincing standard, while a criminal trial requires proof of each element beyond a reasonable doubt.^[14][36] The full process is described in The Title IX sexual misconduct process, and how school definitions differ from the criminal law in Consent under Michigan CSC law.