Campus sexual assault prevention programs could do more to prevent violence, even after a decade-long federal mandate

Meghan Downey of Chatham protests as U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos announces federal policy changes in rules for investigating sexual assault reports on college campuses. . Lawler Duggan/For The Washington Post via Getty Images

Ten years after a federal law required colleges and universities to offer sexual assault prevention programming to students, only about half of them are doing it.

Without a national database containing standardized measures of campus sexual assault over time, it is difficult to determine whether campus sexual assault has decreased since this prevention programming requirement went into effect. One review of campus climate surveys, designed to measure various forms of sexual misconduct at colleges and universities, revealed differences in the ways that schools measure assault.