Dive Brief:

• Stanford University has ruled that a student found to have sexually assaulted a classmate will have to wait until 2016 to enroll in a graduate program, a year longer than his original sanction, but that he does not pose a threat to the campus.
• The ruling was made on an appeal by both the victim and the assailant — the original sanction would have allowed the assailant to return to campus in the fall of 2015 for graduate school, following a yearlong suspension from campus and, before that, being allowed to remain on campus and graduate.
• The Stanford ruling comes at a time when other colleges and universities are making expulsion a mandatory consequence for sexual assaults.

Dive Insight:

Expulsion is mandatory for the worst sexual assault cases at Dartmouth College and Duke University has made expulsion the base penalty for those found to have committed the crime. Stanford is considering making expulsion the default sanction for sexual assault, and the university’s administration is asking for student recommendations on how to improve response and prevention. Hundreds of people held a demonstration last week in support of the victim, and another demonstration was planned for Thursday.