News
Lisa Magnarelli named interim Title IX Coordinator
By Michael Levy ’18
September 3, 2015
Lisa Magnarelli ’96 will serve as Interim Senior Associate Dean of Students and Title IX Coordinator for the 2015-16 academic year. Magnarelli succeeds Meredith Harper Bonham who, since 2011, served both as Senior Associate Dean of Students for Strategic Initiatives and Title IX Coordinator at Hamilton. Harper Bonham, along with her husband Jay Bonham ’93— former Associate Dean of Admission at Hamilton — are making the move to Kenyon College where Harper Bonham will serve as Vice President for Student Affairs.
Since 2000, Lisa Magnarelli has served Hamilton in various capacities in the Division of Student Life.
After an unsuccessful national search for Harper Bonham’s replacement, Magnarelli was chosen to take on the role in the interim for her broad practical experience and continued commitment to serving her alma mater. In an email to The Spectator, Vice President and Dean of Students Nancy Thompson, commented:
“We conducted a search for a Title IX Coordinator last spring, but weren’t convinced we had found the right person for the job. When we thought about people on campus who know and care about students and who could do the job well, Lisa came to mind, and thankfully, she agreed to serve in the interim role and was willing to spend a portion of her summer in training.”
Thompson further noted that the search will reopen again in the spring. Though it is clear that Magnarelli’s current role as Senior Associate Dean of Students and Title IX Coordinator is temporary, Magnarelli does not intend to leave Hamilton in the near future.
Magnarelli’s hopes and ambitions for the academic year align closely with Bonham’s own, and she plans to pick-up precisely where her predecessor left-off last spring.
Upon accepting this new position, Magnarelli acknowledges that there was a lot of catching-up for her to do in regards to educating herself about federal and state gender equity and equal protection mandates, as well as sexual-misconduct prevention and response procedures already put into place on campus. In an interview with The Spectator, Magnarelli noted:
“Meredith was fantastic -- there are very big shoes to fill. I would like to maintain the strides she had made in this position. Her goals had been education and prevention. I would certainly like to continue pursuing those same goals. This really is the focus right now. We have done a great job with our policy, and of making sure it meets both federal and state guidelines.”
The growing role of Title IX Coordinator in academic settings involves staying up-to-date on the latest legislation. Recently there has been a broad effort on the part of academic institutions to amend protocols and refine interpretations of consent. New legislation was passed in New York State regarding the language of sexual assault. New York State’s new legislation of what constitutes consent includes the terms:
“Affirmative consent is a knowing, voluntary and mutual decision among all participants to engage in sexual activity.”
“Consent to any sexual act or prior consensual sexual activity between or with any party does not necessarily constitute consent to any other sexual act.”
When asked about how Hamilton will act to realign its policy with these changes, Magnarelli noted that much of the newly introduced standards had already been included in the College’s rhetoric regarding Title IX. Because the College’s policy already reflected much of the wording recently passed into legislation, very few changes had to be made. Magnarelli observed, “There was some proscribed language that was required that we have had to incorporate into the policy, but they do not change the policy at all. We had affirmative consent language within our policy already, and because of this we had to alter it only slightly to match the language that New York State had in place.”
Though at first there was a learning curve for Magnarelli, certain responsibilities associated with her position were already quite familiar to her. Serving as Greek Life Advisor prior to taking her new role as Title IX Coordinator, Magnarelli has a firm understanding of Hamilton culture and a lot of experience communicating with our fraternities and sororities on campus.
The presence of Greek Life at Hamilton has been subject to recent discourse on campus. When asked about her stance on the issue, Magnarelli commented, “I am an advocate of Greek Life so long as they are contributing positively to the community -- which I think is all we’ve ever wanted for them. I think with some of the changes we’ve made with rush and pledge period -- I’ve seen some really great improvement with the groups. I think they’re focusing on supporting and providing good experiences for their members. I hope they have a long and successful future at Hamilton.”