Under Title IX (20 U.S.C. § 1681), a responsible school employee generally must report incidents of sexual violence which they learn of to the school’s Title IX Coordinator or other appropriate school designee. However, per UW-Madison’s Annual Safety Report: “The University will not disclose identifiable information about research subjects if prohibited by an NIH-issued Certificate of Confidentiality, HIPAA regulations and state laws pertaining to the privacy of health information, or promises of confidentiality made to research subjects pursuant the federally required consent form and authorization form.”

The Office for Civil Rights (the office charged with Title IX compliance), expects that researchers will inform students who report sexual violence how to get information on filing a Title IX complaint. While this only applies to students experiencing sexual violence, it could include a reported assault that happened off campus or even a long time ago. Researchers should direct such students to our Title IX website which designates our Coordinator and includes information on how to file a complaint: https://compliance.wisc.edu/titleix/.