Workers and students who experience civil rights violations have a plethora of legal tools at their disposal to seek accountability and relief—ranging from constitutional, to statutory, to tort claims. But the courthouse doors have long been closed to one group, whose exclusion from remedies by the government which they defend is particularly jarring: members of […]

In November 2020, the New York State Judicial Committee on Women in the Courts released its 2020 Gender Survey, detailing the treatment of women attorneys, litigants, and court employees in the state court system. While the study found that the treatment of women has improved markedly in the last few decades, it also found that […]

On August 14, 2020, the Department of Education’s final regulations regarding sexual harassment under Title IX went into effect. This marks the final step in a controversial process that began in November 2018, when President Trump’s Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos submitted a proposal to drastically overhaul many aspects of the Title IX guidelines instituted […]

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibits colleges, universities, and schools that receive federal funding from engaging in sex discrimination.  Like all legal claims, there are strict time limitations (the “statute of limitations”) within which a Title IX claim must be filed.  Because Title IX does not explicitly set a statute of limitations, […]

Graduate school can be an exciting time in a person’s life.  Especially if you start a graduate program immediately after completing college, you can expect to spend the remaining years of your 20s honing your areas of academic expertise, completing a dissertation, and building meaningful professional connections with prominent faculty and staff in your chosen […]

The Federal Fair Housing Act, along with many state and local laws, prohibits gender discrimination in housing, including sexual harassment. It is illegal for landlords, property managers, real estate agents, and maintenance staff to demand sexual favors in exchange for access to housing or repairs. They also cannot create a hostile environment for tenants based […]

The #MeToo Movement continues to call attention to victims of sexual violence and discrimination. A chorus of survivors’ voices grows. More and more survivors are filing sex discrimination lawsuits to vindicate their rights in court and hold accountable both the perpetrators who harmed them and the institutions that failed to protect them. Often it is […]

Although many employees describe what they face at work as a “hostile work environment,” frequently what they are experiencing or observing is evidence of another type of workplace discrimination. It is therefore important for employees who believe they are experiencing discrimination in the workplace—and the lawyers who represent them—to look closely and carefully at all […]

The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure generally require that a publicly filed lawsuit name all the parties involved.  However, under certain circumstances, plaintiffs can avoid disclosing their name by filing a lawsuit using a pseudonym (such as “Jane Doe” or “John Doe”).  Although the use of a pseudonym commonly arises in sexual harassment cases, some […]

Researchers at Vanderbilt Law School have found an alarming disparity in the job satisfaction rates between recent male and female law graduates, as detailed in a forthcoming research paper in the Marquette Law Review. The researchers discovered that “recently graduated female lawyers are 19 percentage points less likely to state that they are very satisfied […]

As of October 9, 2018, New York State employers are now required to provide sexual harassment training pursuant to the State’s recently enacted sexual harassment prevention legislation, Section 201-g of the New York State Labor Law. This new law requires that all employers within New York, both private and public, provide annual anti-harassment training to […]

Universities and employers have a duty to respond to allegations of sexual assault, harassment, and discrimination. Many organizations conduct investigations before responding, and plaintiffs have filed gender discrimination lawsuits based on the investigations themselves. For one example, read coverage of Sanford Heisler Sharp’s trial about a Columbia University investigation here. Whether an investigation is so […]

The EEOC first convened its Select Task Force on the Study of Harassment in the Workplace in 2015 and 2016.  The Task Force issued a report and several recommendations aimed at employers and the EEOC itself. The Task Force’s 2016 report foreshadowed many of the issues that would later become central to the #MeToo conversation.  […]

In my legal writing class my first year of law school, each student presented mock oral arguments, and received feedback from classmates.  Following my argument, I was told that I was “persuasive” and “well prepared,” but what resonated most was the handful of classmates who described my argument as “aggressive.”  One classmate felt that I […]

The #MeToo movement has shined an unflattering light on employer-mandated arbitration agreements, which commonly prevent victims of sexual harassment from speaking publicly about their experiences. Mandatory and confidential arbitration has the effect of forcing women into silence, while allowing perpetrators to continue to harass and assault other employees.  With the rise of the #MeToo movement, […]