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“No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance…”
— 20 U.S.C.§ 1681

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (Title IX) prohibits discrimination based on gender in educational programs which receive federal financial assistance. The law allows all students to attend school in an environment free of harassment, sexual misconduct, and discrimination.

While Title IX is well known for its application to athletics, other programs and activities are also included such as recruitment, admissions, financial aid and scholarships; course offerings and access; hiring and retention; and benefits and leave. Title IX also protects all students and employees, regardless of gender identity, from unlawful sexual harassment in school programs and activities. The requirements of Title IX pertaining to sexual harassment also cover sexual violence.

Connecticut State Community College (CSCC) takes our responsibility to address and protect these rights very seriously and is committed to providing an environment free from discrimination on the basis of sex. Pursuant to Title IX, CSCC’s Title IX Coordinator is the designated agent for the college with primary responsibility for coordinating the college’s Title IX compliance efforts, this can include but is not limited to: overseeing the complaint process, addressing patterns or systemic problems, ensuring issues are addressed consistently and in adherence with the procedures, prepare and disseminate informational materials, and coordinate trainings/in-services for faculty and staff.

Any CSCC student or employee can contact the Title IX Coordinator with questions or to file a complaint.

CSCC Title IX Coordinator:
Dr. John-Paul Chaisson-Cardenas
VP of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
johnpaul.chaissoncardenas@ctstate.edu 
860-612-7056

Each campus has a campus-based Deputy Title IX Coordinator who is available to support the students on campus, receive complaints, help students navigate the process, and answer questions.

There are campus-based counselors who can provide confidential counseling for students on all twelve of CT State’s campuses. Other free, confidential resources exist in the local communities around our 12 campuses. 

Some CSCU/BOR policies that may be connected to Title IX or have a higher likelihood of being relevant to a Title IX concern are the following:

• CSCU Codes of Conduct (students and employees)
• Continuing Notice of Nondiscrimination
• Interim Discriminatory Harassment, Nondiscrimination and Title IX Policy

Sexual misconduct incorporates a range of behaviors including sexual assault, sexual harassment, intimate partner violence, stalking, voyeurism, and any other conduct of a sexual nature that is nonconsensual or has the purpose or effect of threatening, intimidating, or coercing a person.

Sexual harassment includes requests for sexual favors, sexual advances or other sexual conduct when (1) submission is either explicitly or implicitly a condition affecting academic or employment decisions; (2) the behavior is sufficiently severe or pervasive as to create an intimidating, hostile or repugnant environment; or (3) the behavior persists despite objection by the person to whom the conduct is directed.

Sexual Assault is compelling by force, or the threat of force, the following: (1) Sexual penetration of the vagina or anus, including by a finger or an object; (2) Oral sex; (3) Contact with a person’s genital area, groin, anus, inner thighs, buttocks, or breasts for the purpose of sexual gratification of the actor or for the purpose of degrading or humiliating the victim; (4) Subjecting another to such sexual contact without consent.

Interpersonal Violence occurs when one person uses power and control over another through physical, sexual, or emotional threats or actions, economic control, isolation, or other kinds of coercive behavior. Some types of interpersonal violence are:

Domestic/Family Violence means an incident resulting in physical harm, bodily injury or assault, or an act of threatened violence that constitutes fear of imminent physical harm, bodily injury or assault, including, but not limited to, stalking or a pattern of threatening, between family or household members.

Dating/Relationship Violence occurs when one intimate or romantic partner tries to maintain power and control over the other through words and actions that are physically and emotionally abusive. Dating violence can take many forms including physical violence, coercion, threats, intimidation, isolation, and emotional, sexual or economic abuse.

Sexual Violence is any type of sexual activity that a person does not agree to. It includes sexual assault; sexual exploitation; stalking; sexual harassment; voyeurism; exposure; and sexual activity resulting from emotional coercion.

Consent occurs when all parties are legally able to consent based on their age (16 in CT). The agreement is based on an awareness of the specific sexual behavior in question. This agreement must be active, ongoing, unimpaired and it is able to be withdrawn at any point. Consent is a must for every form of sexual activity every time. A person has the right to withdraw consent even if that person has consented to sexual activity with that individual in the past. It is not valid if there is force, threats, intimidation, or coercion used. Connecticut State Law is clear that having sexual intercourse with someone who cannot consent is rape.

Connecticut State Community College and its locations, including its central office, (together “CT State”), respect the privacy of individuals as fundamental to its mission.

CT State is committed to protecting personal privacy and keeping personal information secure in its operations, activities and management of information. As a public institution, CT State must balance this commitment with other important commitments, including public accountability and open access to public records.

You should be aware that the CT State may be required to disclose your information in response to a valid legal process, such as a search warrant, subpoena or court order, or pursuant to the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) Notice and Directory Information Policy (Board of Regents for Higher Education policy) or the Connecticut Freedom of InformationAct (FOIA). Disclosures may also be necessary to protect CT State’s legal rights or during health or safety emergencies.

This privacy notice applies to the main CT State website (www.ctstate.edu) and any approved third party application or platform embedded in the website and/or operated by CT State Central Office to conduct its operations, and explains CT State practices concerning the collection, use and disclosure of users’ personally identifiable information and other information.

This privacy notice does not apply to information collected by: (1) CT State outside its website or Central Office approved third-party applications or platforms, (2) through any other site operated by a CT State campus or any third party, or (3) by any third party that may link to or be accessible via the CT State website.

CT State and its third-party vendors may automatically collect certain information regarding your use of the CT State website, such as your IP address, browser type, session information, the pages you visit and referral websites.

This information is used to create aggregate summary statistics, which are typically used for purposes such as assessing what information is of most interest to users,

determining technical design specifications, and identifying system performance or problem areas.

User information may be shared with third-party vendors to the extent necessary to provide and improve web services or other communications to users. For example, we may use third party tools to generate reports on site usage, web traffic, user behavior, and user interests in order to optimize our website for our visitors. We may also use geographic, demographic, and interest-based reports of our website visitors to create custom audience lists.

We prohibit any third parties who receive user information for this purpose from using or sharing user information for any purpose other than providing services for the benefit of our users.

Cookies are small files that are stored on your computer (unless you block them). We may use cookies to understand and save your preferences for future visits and compile aggregate data about site traffic and site interaction so that we can offer better site experiences and tools in the future. A variety of tools are available to control the data collected by cookies, web beacons and similar technologies. For example, internet browsers contain controls to limit how websites you visit use cookies and to withdraw your consent by clearing or blocking cookies.

The CT State website may contain links to other sites. We are not responsible for the privacy practices, the content or the cookies set by such sites. Since the cookie policies of these sites change over time, you should determine their policies by visiting the privacy policy pages of these sites directly.

CT State and our third-party vendors may collect, through online forms, personally identifiable information that can be used to identify you as an individual including, but not limited to: name, Banner ID, permanent mailing address, telephone number, email address or any other information that is linked or linkable to an individual, such as biometric, medical, educational, financial or employment information. We may also collect other information as described in this privacy notice.

CT State may process personally identifiable information for a number of reasons, including, but not limited to, create or meet contractual obligations, legitimately conduct its business operations, or to comply with applicable law. Sometimes, consent will be required for processing your personally identifiable information. In these cases, CT State will ask for your consent to process your personally identifiable information and to share that information with third parties. The processing of personally identifiable information provided to CT State by you or from authorized third parties, for example your high school, another higher education institution, or a national testing service, enables CT State to identify you; engage in processing an application or other submission to CT State; or verify information already provided to CT State.

CT State may use the personally identifiable information we gather from you to respond to your inquiries and fulfill your requests, when you contact us via one of our online contact forms or otherwise; for example, when you send us questions, suggestions, compliments or complaints, or when you request other information.

We may use the information we gather from you when you subscribe through our Website for various program and service updates and notifications.

We may use the information we gather from you for systems administration purposes, abuse prevention, optimization, performance tracking, and analytics, and for other purposes described in this Privacy Notice.

We may provide your information to third parties in circumstances where we believe that doing so is necessary or appropriate to satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or governmental request; detect, prevent or otherwise address fraud, security, or technical issues; or protect our rights and safety and the rights and safety of our users or others.

We do not share, sell, swap, rent or otherwise disclose or authorize any third party to use your personally identifiable information for commercial purposes without your permission.

Where participating in a service or receiving communications is optional, you can choose whether you wish to receive promotional emails, SMS messages or telephone calls from CT State but, in some cases, your ability to access or control your personally identifiable information will be limited, as required or permitted by applicable law.

If you want to access the personally identifiable information processed by CT State that is not available directly through the consent and preference management tools provided within the CT State communication or service, contact us at CSCU-DataPrivacy@ct.edu.

CT State uses risk-assessed administrative, technical and physical security measures to protect your personal information. There are reasonable security measures in place to help protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of the information under our control. Your data will be stored in a secure operating environment that is not accessible without authorization. CT State cannot guarantee the security of information on or transmitted via the internet as no method of transmission over the internet or method of electronic storage is one hundred percent secure.

If you are located in the European Union, Iceland, Liechtenstein or Norway (the “European Economic Area”), please familiarize yourself with your rights under the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”).

CT State follows the following GDPR principles in order to protect your privacy:

• We do not collect any more personal information about you than is necessary;
• We only use your personal information for the purposes we specify in this privacy notice, unless you agree otherwise; and
• Other than as we specify in this privacy notice, we do not share your personal information with third parties.

You have the right to access the personal information that is maintained about you by CT State. To the extent such rights are provided to you by applicable law, if you would like to request to review, correct, update, suppress, restrict or delete your personal information that you have previously provided to us, object to the processing of personal information or if you would like to request to receive an electronic copy of your personal information, please contact CT State at CSCU-DataPrivacy@ct.edu. We will respond to your request consistent with applicable law.

CT State retains personal information for as long as needed or permitted in light of the purpose(s) for which it was obtained and consistent with applicable law.

The criteria used to determine our retention periods include:

• The length of time we have an ongoing relationship with you and provide the services to you, for example, for as long as you have an account with us or keep using our services;

• Whether there is a legal obligation to which we are subject, for example, certain laws require us to keep records of your transactions for a certain period of time before we can delete them; or

• Whether retention is advisable in light of our legal position such as in regard to applicable statutes of limitations, litigation or regulatory investigations.

This site is not directed to children under the age of thirteen, does not sell products or services intended for purchase by children, and does not knowingly collect or store any personal information, even in aggregate, about children under the age of thirteen.

This privacy notice may be amended from time-to-time. Any such changes will be posted on this page.

If you have questions or concerns about this privacy notice, please contact us at CSCU-DataPrivacy@ct.edu and provide a brief description of your inquiry.

The effective date of this privacy notice is July 1, 2023.

File a Discrimination and/or Sexual Harassment/Misconduct Complaint

File a Complaint

The Office of Equity and Civil Rights (ECR) works to promote a respectful, accessible and inclusive environment to all students, staff, and community within the CT State Community College, Charter Oak State College and CSCU System.

Connecticut State Community College does not discriminate on the basis of race; color; religious creed; age; gender; gender identity or expression; national origin; marital status; ancestry; present or past history of intellectual disability, learning disability or physical disability; veteran status; sexual orientation; genetic information or criminal record.

The following person has been designated to respond to inquiries regarding the non-discrimination policies: Dr. John-Paul Chaisson-Cardenas, CT State Title IX Coordinator, Connecticut State Community College, 185 Main Street, New Britain, CT 06051.

Connecticut State Community College is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer and strongly encourages the applications of women, minorities, persons with disabilities, and veterans.

• Monitor college/campus compliance with relevant CSCU policies and all state and federal EEO/AA/Civil Rights laws including, but not limited to, Title VII, Title IX, and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
• Provide direction and guidance on search compliance and diversity recruitment efforts
• Provide career counseling for employees seeking career mobility
• Develop Affirmative Action plans and programs in accordance with the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities (CHRO) AA Regulations
• Provide reasonable accommodations for employees or job applicants in accordance with the ADA
• Conduct and coordinate state-mandated training (Diversity, Sexual Harassment, Title IX and ADA)
  • NEOGOV Learn Course Enrollment Instructions
  • Hiring Manager’s Assurance of Equity and Equal Opportunity in the Search Process

• Investigate allegations of discrimination and sexual harassment and make recommendations for resolution in collaboration with the Labor Relations COE
• Facilitate informal resolution/mediation of complaints
• Interim Discriminatory Harassment, Nondiscrimination, and Title IX Policy
• Procedure for Title IX-Related Matters
• Procedure for All Other Forms of Discrimination and/or Harassment

An equity review is an evaluative process that assesses the status, effectiveness, and progress of CT State units or programs from a DEI lens. There are two types of equity reviews:

1. Participatory Equity Study: This kind of participatory action evaluation process is designed to support CT State units and programs in their equity and inclusion efforts or when a unit or program is experiencing inclusion or equity challenges. This process usually starts with a data review related to the presenting goal and ends with a written report to the unit or program and its senior vertical leader(s).
2. Equity or Compliance Review: This compulsory process can only be triggered by the CT State President or VP of DEI. This type of review is designed to assess and address systemic compliance, climate, inclusion, equity, and civil rights issues. This type of review usually requires that the unit or program develop an affirmative plan to remedy any or all findings. Remedial plans are then monitored by the DEI Office.

1. To fulfill our CT State Mission: CT State Community College (CT State) provides access to academically rigorous and innovative educationand training focused on student success. The college supports excellence in teaching and learning, makes data-informed decisions, promotes equity, and advances positive change for the students, communities, and industries it serves.
2. To fulfill our equity commitment: CT State commits to bold and disruptive change by actively identifying, naming, and dismantling structural racism, systemic poverty, and other barriers, establishing equitable and anti-racist policies and practices, and empowering students, faculty, staff, and administrators to advance racial, social, and economic justice. Our core collective responsibility is to continuously assess practices and policies and transform the world we live in by eliminating inequities.
3. To ensure civil rights compliance throughout the college.

**Please note that the DEI Office will first offer units or programs the opportunity to engage in a participatory equity review process. This is because we believe that positive active engagement by staff, faculty, and administrators yields better plans and recommendations than compulsory processes.

• Participate in developing and enforcing workplace policies and procedures to ensure compliance with laws and regulations regarding all protected classes
• Work with established civil rights compliance committees
• Work with all departments in efforts to promote diversity, inclusion and equity
• Participate in developing and enforcing workplace policies and procedures to ensure compliance with laws and regulations regarding all protected classes
• Work to establish a Diversity & Inclusion Committee that represents staff from all 12 CC, Charter Oak State College and CSCU System
• Work with all of the Centers of Excellence in efforts to promote diversity, inclusion and equity

CT State Community College, as part of the Connecticut State Colleges & Universities System is committed to making this website accessible to visitors with disabilities and is continually working to increase its accessibility and usability. CTState.edu strives to conform to Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1, Level AA. These recommendations outline how to make website content accessible to a wider range of people with disabilities. Please be aware that our efforts are ongoing. If, at any time, you have specific questions, feedback, or accessibility issues, please contact us at yvonne.page@ctstate.edu. If you do encounter an accessibility issue, please be sure to specify the Web page/URL in your email, and we will work to resolve the problem as soon as possible.

• Digital Accessibility at CSCU
• CSCU Digital Accessibility Policy