Filing a Report and Types of Reports

• Reports by phone may be made to the Confidential and Independent Campus Conduct Hotline: 866-943-5787
• Electronic anonymous complaints may be submitted by completing the form found here. Using this form, the information you shared will be accessed by the Title IX Office while your identity is kept anonymous. Be advised, however, that the College may be limited in its ability to fully investigate anonymous reports.

With the exception of employees in the College’s Health and Wellness Center, all other College employees, including student employees, who receive information of sexual misconduct are required to report it to the College Confidential Advisor or the Title IX Coordinator.

• Reports by phone may be made to the Confidential and Independent Campus Conduct Hotline: 866-943-5787. Please be advised that the College may be limited in its ability to fully investigate anonymous reports.

To Whom You May File a Report or Share Confidentially (they will only share information with our office or police if you give permission to do so):

• On campus:
  • Confidential Advisor from the Health and Wellness Center: 847-735-5240, healthandwellness@lakeforest.edu.

Ask to speak with a confidential advisor regarding a concern of dating or domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking. They will provide supportive or interim measures, share your rights and options, campus policy and procedures, and other support. This is different than engaging for counseling services. This does not constitution filing a report with the institution, rather to explore your options and assist accordingly.

• Off-campus:
  • A Safe Place (Domestic Violence: Reach the 24-hour support line at (847) 249-4450 or 1-800-600-SAFE or TTY: 847-249-6557
  • Zacharias Center (Z-Center) (Sexual Assault): Reach the 24-hour support line at (847) 872-7799
    • Lake County Location
      
      • 4275 Old Grand Ave., Gurnee, IL 60031
    • Cook County Location
      • 4232 Dempster St., Skokie, IL 60076

With the exception of employees in the College’s Health and Wellness Center, all other College employees, including student employees, who receive information of sexual misconduct are required to report it to the College Confidential Advisor or Title IX Coordinator.

• Non-confidential and non-anonymous reports can be made through the non-anonymous reporting form here. You can also directly reach out to the Title IX Office Coordinator or to the campus Public Safety.   
  • Title IX Office titleix@lakeforest.edu 
  • Public Safety: 847-735-5555

Additionally, you can reach out to responsible employees who will direct you to the Title IX office. Those employees are college staff and faculty, including student employees. If you’re looking to report confidentially, see the accordion above.

Non-consensual sexual penetration or contact, domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking are crimes. Individuals are encouraged, but not required, to report these crimes to the police. The Title IX Coordinator and Public Safety will assist individuals wishing to make a report to the police. For information on how to file a complaint with local law enforcement, see accordion below.

• You can directly reach out to local law enforcement and file a complaint with them. If the incident occurred on campus, the Lake Forest Police Department has jurisdiction and can be contacted at:

Lake Forest Police Department 255 W. Deerpath Rd., Lake Forest, IL 60045 847-234-2601 (non-emergency) 911 (emergency).

• For incidents in Chicago, contact:

Chicago Police Department 1718 South State Street, Chicago, IL 60616 312-745-4290 (non-emergency) 911 (emergency).

A complaint must be filed within 180 days of the date of the alleged discrimination, unless the time for filing is extended for good cause by the Enforcement Office Director. Prior to filing a complaint with OCR against an institution, a potential complainant may want to use his or her school's institutional grievance process to have the complaint resolved (though a complainant is not required by law to use the institutional grievance procedure before filing a complaint with OCR). If a complainant uses an institutional grievance process, his or her Title IX complaint must be filed with OCR within 60 days after the last act of the institutional grievance process.

• Submit online through the electronic submission of the pre-prepared OCR complaint form.

• Submit this PDF complaint form by email to OCR@ed.gov

Regardless of how you file, you will need to sign and mail a consent form to allow the OCR to process your complaint. This can be found in the PDF version of the complaint form, or if you are submitting electronically, will be given to you after you complete the form but before you press the final submit button.

If the OCR believes the information you provided is insufficient, they may contact you and ask for further details. Your addendums must be submitted within 20 days of the OCR’s request.

If an investigation indicates there has been a violation of Title IX, OCR attempts to obtain voluntary compliance and negotiate remedies. Only when it cannot obtain voluntary compliance does OCR initiate enforcement action. Enforcement usually consists of referring a case to the Department of Justice for court action, or initiating proceedings, before an administrative law judge, to terminate Federal funding to the recipient's program or activity in which the prohibited discrimination occurred. Terminations are made only after the recipient has had an opportunity for a hearing before an administrative law judge, and after all other appeals have been exhausted.