Dillon was the lawyer who sued the Obama administration in 2016, arguing its guidance was unlawful because it didn't go through the proper approval process. But he says that case was different because it specifically named a student and a school harmed by the policy. That lawsuit was withdrawn after the Obama-era guidance was revoked by the Trump administration.
Dillon calls DeVos' September 2017 guidance a "good tonal shift, and a good signal to universities that the era of ignoring due process is over." While he says he is disappointed that it hasn't yet sparked more changes in campus policies, he says campuses that are making changes are making things more fair.
For example, he says that DeVos' new rules protect students from being "ambushed" without knowing the charges or evidence against them and that interim measures now tend to be less "draconian." And if not, Dillon says, the new guidance makes it easier to assert accused students' due process rights, as happened when a school kicked one of his clients off campus while an investigation was still pending.
"I went to them and cited the guidance and said, 'You can't do this, you're interfering with his education,' " he recalls. "And in that case, I was able to persuade them to let him back on campus."
For schools, the change has brought some measure of confusion. Most are taking a wait-and-see approach, as DeVos is expected to propose permanent rules this fall. It may take until the end of the school year, or longer, for those rules to be finalized.
In the meantime, campuses continue to face lawsuits from alleged victims and increasingly successful legal challenges from accused students.
"In a lot of ways, it does feel like you're a bit caught in the middle," says Martha Alexander, executive director of the Office Of Institutional Equity and Equal Opportunity and Title IX coordinator for the University of Kentucky.
The university just changed its policy in June. It keeps the standard of evidence low, but Alexander says, "To make it a more balanced policy to make sure all parties had a fair shot," it builds in more due process protections for accused students. Hearing panels now need to be unanimous when finding a student at fault, and only accused students are now allowed to bring appeals.
"I think that this policy, and these changes, really is a step towards getting to a more fair system," Alexander says.
Many campuses say they welcome what they see as more freedom to set rules as they see fit, with less onerous oversight from the government.
Peter McDonough, vice president and general counsel for the American Council on Education, a group that represents college and university presidents, says many college presidents are no longer operating in constant fear of the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, which oversees enforcement of Title IX, the federal law that bars gender discrimination in education.
Back in the days of the Obama administration, when an individual student complained to the OCR about his or her school, the office would not only investigate that case it would automatically trigger a systemic investigation of the school, checking for anything else that might be amiss, which could take years. Campuses felt investigations would stay open "until something was found," McDonough says, which was viewed as a "gotcha approach."
Under the Trump administration, a student complaint to the government is treated more like an isolated incident. McDonough says schools now see the government as more ally than adversary.