Strategic Title IX Interviewing

For Investigators Already Trained by ATIXA

If you already hold ATIXA Level 1, 2, or 3 credentials, this course is the interview-technique training that pairs with what you already know. Your ATIXA training taught you the process, the regulatory framework, and the procedural discipline required to run a Title IX case. This course teaches you the conversation. The 90 minutes with the complainant, the 60 minutes with the respondent, and the 30 minutes with the witness where the record either gets built cleanly or gets contaminated.

Strategic Title IX Interviewing is not a replacement for ATIXA training. It is the interview-technique training a Coordinator adds after ATIXA to close the gap that shows up in appeal, OCR review, and civil litigation.

Built For

Designed for every role that runs a Title IX interview.

Strategic Title IX Interviewing is calibrated for the roles most directly accountable for the integrity of Title IX findings. Full-time Coordinators and dual-role administrators alike. K-12 and higher education.

Title IX Coordinators and Deputy Coordinators

The role most directly accountable for the integrity of the Title IX investigation. The course provides the interview methodology that holds up under OCR review, appeal, and civil litigation. Pairs cleanly with ATIXA administrator credentialing.

Athletic Compliance and Athletics Title IX

The investigators handling Title IX matters in athletic departments, where peer dynamics, coach involvement, and institutional pressure converge. Calibrated technique for the cases that draw the most external scrutiny, delivered specifically for athletic compliance staff, sport supervisors, and senior women administrators.

Deans of Students and Conduct Administrators

The professionals who conduct Title IX-adjacent student conduct investigations in higher education. Same methodology, adapted for the sexual misconduct, harassment, and hostile-environment cases that overlap conduct and Title IX jurisdiction.

K-12 Principals and Assistant Principals (Title IX and DASA)

The administrators handling Title IX and Dignity for All Students Act (DASA) investigations at the K-12 level. Every technique adapted for age-appropriate interviewing and the specific evidentiary realities of K-12 records. New York DASA and federal Title IX covered in one framework.

Education-sector HR investigators handling employee misconduct are referred to ASC's Strategic Workplace Interviewing course, which is the correct fit for employment-side investigations.

Course Overview

What you will learn and apply

Available in one-day or two-day formats, Strategic Title IX Interviewing teaches Coordinators, investigators, and administrators how to conduct Title IX interviews that produce reliable, uncontaminated records, treat every party with equal fairness, and survive appeal, OCR review, and civil litigation. The course pairs cleanly with ATIXA administrator credentialing and closes the interview-technique gap that most Title IX training does not address.

Learning Outcomes

Interview technique that meets Title IX regulatory requirements under both the 2020 and 2024 rules
Impartial questioning of complainants, respondents, and witnesses under the same disciplined methodology
Trauma-informed technique applied to complainant interviews without eroding due process for respondents
Age-appropriate technique for K-12 students under Title IX and DASA
Contamination avoidance across sequenced complainant, witness, and respondent interviews
Documentation standards that withstand appellate review and civil discovery
Recognizing inconsistency as trauma physiology rather than deception, applied consistently to all parties
Athletic Title IX interviewing where peer, coach, and institutional pressures apply

Equal Rigor

Same Rigor. Complainant. Respondent. Witness.

Title IX under both the 2020 and 2024 rules explicitly requires impartial treatment of complainants and respondents. Most trauma-informed Title IX training focuses on complainants. Strategic Title IX Interviewing applies the same disciplined interview methodology to every party at the table.

For the complainant interview

Trauma-informed technique, rapport-first entry, sensory-anchored open-ended recall, contamination-free question design. The complainant gets an interview built to produce their most complete and accurate account without re-traumatization.

For the respondent interview

The same rapport-first entry, the same open-ended question design, the same trauma-aware recognition that stress-affected memory is not deception. Plus disciplined challenge questioning through the Alignment Method (Compass Direction Eight) that tests the account without sliding into accusatorial interrogation the way older interrogation models did.

For the witness interview

Sequenced, non-contaminating, and calibrated for the peer, faculty, coach, or parent role the witness holds. Structured to avoid cross-witness contamination that compromises the record.

The equal-rigor claim is not marketing language. It is the exact standard OCR-defensible practice requires, and it is what separates Title IX findings that hold up on appeal from Title IX findings that get reversed.

The Core Principle

Why Title IX Findings Fail on Appeal

Most Title IX findings get reversed long before the appeal is filed.

They get reversed in the interview itself, where the seven failure modes below contaminate the record before anyone has a chance to evaluate the case.

Erosion of impartiality between complainant and respondent

Premature credibility judgments before the record is complete

Leading questions that shape the account rather than elicit it

Trauma-informed technique applied to one party and not the other

Age-inappropriate questioning of minors under Title IX and DASA

Cross-witness contamination in sequenced peer interviews

Documentation that does not anticipate OCR review, appeal, or civil discovery

Strategic Title IX Interviewing teaches Coordinators, investigators, and administrators how to avoid those failures through a structured, evidence-based interview framework rooted in investigative interviewing science, trauma-informed practice, and documentation standards aligned to Title IX regulatory requirements.

The objective is not to confirm what the institution already suspects. The objective is a fair, complete, defensible record.

The Compass, Calibrated for Title IX

Eight strategic directions. Built for the standards Title IX findings are held to.

The methodology Strategic Title IX Interviewing delivers is organized around the Adaptive Strategies Compass™, an eight-direction investigative framework calibrated specifically for Title IX complainant, respondent, and witness interviewing. Each direction maps to a specific moment in the Title IX interview where Coordinators, investigators, and administrators routinely lose impartiality, accuracy, or defensibility.

1Direction One

Teach to Talk®

Fair, evidence-based, non-coercive dialogue that produces accurate disclosure across complainants, respondents, and witnesses. The conversational discipline that protects due process for every party at the table.

2Direction Two

ACCESS Model

A six-stage investigative thinking framework (Assess, Collect, Collate, Evaluate, Survey, Summarize) applied to the full arc of a Title IX or conduct investigation from intake notice through final determination.

3Direction Three

Personality Assessment (DISC)

Reading communication style across students, faculty, staff, and parents. The same incident described by different communication styles produces different statements. Knowing this protects the integrity of the record and the impartiality of the finding.

4Direction Four

Cognitive Interview

The most research-validated technique for improving recall accuracy, applied to complainant and witness interviews where the incident may have occurred weeks, months, or longer before the conversation. Context reinstatement and varied retrieval surface details that standard administrative interviewing routinely misses.

5Direction Five

Route Map

Pre-interview planning that anticipates the sequencing of complainant, witness, and respondent interviews, where each conversation will branch, and how to navigate when the account develops in real time without contaminating later interviews in the sequence.

6Direction Six

Motive Mapping

Five lenses (Rationalize, Project, Minimize, Socialize, Emphasize the Truth) for understanding why a complainant, respondent, or witness is presenting their account the way they are. Applied with equal rigor to every party at the table.

7Direction Seven

Strategic Use of Evidence (SUE)

Sequencing evidence and exhibits so the interview tests consistency without crossing into accusation. The technique that preserves impartiality even when the investigator believes they know what happened.

8Direction Eight

Alignment Method

Challenge-and-clarify questioning that resolves contradictions in testimony fairly. Disciplined intervention that produces clarification rather than confession, and stays inside the procedural limits Title IX and conduct frameworks explicitly require.

Every direction in this Compass deploys in education-sector investigations. Title IX coordinators, deans, conduct administrators, and HR partners leave this course with the complete framework, calibrated for the matters their institutions actually handle.

Explore the Adaptive Strategies Compass™ →

Positioning

What makes this course different

The Title IX training market is crowded but concentrated. Strategic Title IX Interviewing occupies a specific position no other trainer holds.

Interview technique, not process compliance

ATIXA teaches the regulatory process. Law firms teach the legal risk. Consultant firms teach institutional strategy. This course teaches the actual conversation. The 90 minutes with a complainant, the 60 minutes with a respondent, the 30 minutes with a witness where the record either gets built cleanly or gets contaminated. That interview-technique gap is what shows up on appeal and what OCR-defensible practice actually requires.

A career investigator, not an attorney or an administrator

Most Title IX trainers are attorneys, ATIXA-credentialed consultants, or higher-education administrators. Joseph R. Auriemma, Jr. is a career criminal investigator. Twenty-four years with the New York State Police, including two years assigned to the Ulster County Child Advocacy Center from 2006 to 2008 and six years in Major Crimes. That practitioner background is the credibility Title IX Coordinators recognize immediately and cannot get from an attorney or an administrator.

Trauma-informed technique grounded in live CAC-affiliated practice

Joe was trained in the Finding Words forensic interview protocol (later reorganized into ChildFirst®) while assigned to the Ulster County Child Advocacy Center, plus New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services training in Basic Interview and Interrogation and in vulnerable-victim investigation. This training was completed more than a decade before New York formalized its statewide Trauma-Informed Victim Response Training Standards in June 2019. Almost no Title IX trainer in the market carries an operational trauma-informed practitioner credential that predates the state standards by that margin.

Equal rigor for complainants and respondents

Most trauma-informed Title IX training centers on the complainant. Strategic Title IX Interviewing applies the same interview discipline to every party at the table, which is what OCR-defensible practice requires and what separates findings that survive appeal from findings that get reversed.

Complementary to ATIXA, not competitive

The course names ATIXA explicitly and positions itself as the interview-technique training a Coordinator adds after ATIXA. Buy both. They cover different ground and neither one substitutes for the other.

Living regulatory analysis in the ASC Insights library

Ongoing long-form analysis of Title IX regulatory changes, interview research, and case law, published free at the ASC Insights library. Strategic Title IX Interviewing is delivered by a trainer who is paying continuous attention to the field, not by a shop that ran the same slide deck for the last decade.

About the Instructor

Built from real investigations, calibrated for the standards Title IX requires.

Joseph R. Auriemma, Jr.

Certified Forensic Interviewer (CFI) · IADLEST National Certified Instructor (INCI) · Certified Polygraph Examiner · Retired Senior Investigator, New York State Police

Joseph R. Auriemma, Jr. is a retired Senior Investigator with the New York State Police, lead instructor at the New York State Police Academy for Investigative Interviewing, and a contributor at the New York State Preparedness Training Center in Investigative Interviewing. Across a 24-year law enforcement career, he conducted and supervised thousands of interviews involving sexual offenses, violent crime, victim and witness disclosures, and high-stakes subject interactions, the same evidentiary and procedural disciplines Title IX investigations demand of every Coordinator, investigator, and administrator.

Joe was trained in the Finding Words forensic interview protocol (later reorganized into ChildFirst®) while assigned to the Ulster County Child Advocacy Center from 2006 to 2008, with additional New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services training in Basic Interview and Interrogation and in vulnerable-victim investigation, focused at the time on best-practice protocols for interviewing children and elderly complainants. Those trainings were completed more than a decade before New York formalized its statewide Trauma-Informed Victim Response Training Standards in June 2019.

Today Joe applies that investigative methodology to Title IX interview training, helping Coordinators, athletic compliance officers, deans, and K-12 principals conduct interviews that are impartial, trauma-informed, and defensible on appeal.

Full Bio →

Closing Note

Due process and trauma-informed practice are not in tension. Disciplined interviewing is how you do both.

The Title IX Coordinators, athletic compliance officers, deans, and K-12 principals who consistently produce findings that survive appeal, OCR review, and litigation are not the ones with sharper instincts. They are the ones with a structured interview methodology, an impartial framework applied with equal rigor to complainants and respondents, and documentation that does not need to be rewritten when the record is challenged.

Contact Advanced Strategic Communications to bring Strategic Title IX Interviewing to your institution and equip your team for the interviews where the quality of the conversation determines the quality of the finding.

FAQ

Common questions about Strategic Title IX Interviewing

Is this course Title IX compliant?

Yes. The course is built around current Title IX regulatory requirements under both the 2020 and 2024 rules for interviewing complainants, respondents, and witnesses. Fair and impartial questioning, contamination avoidance, and documentation that withstands OCR review and appeal. Curriculum updates reflect the most recent regulatory changes.

Does it cover DASA (New York’s Dignity for All Students Act)?

Yes. The course addresses DASA-specific investigation requirements alongside Title IX at the K-12 level, including age-appropriate techniques for interviewing students, documentation standards, and interventions that protect both student welfare and institutional defensibility.

Is this a replacement for ATIXA training?

No. ATIXA teaches the regulatory process, the legal framework, and the procedural discipline required to run a Title IX case. Strategic Title IX Interviewing teaches interview technique. The 90 minutes with a complainant, the 60 minutes with a respondent, the 30 minutes with a witness where the record either gets built cleanly or gets contaminated. This course is the interview-technique training a Coordinator adds after ATIXA to close the gap that shows up in appeal, OCR review, and civil litigation.

Does this course cover both K-12 and higher education?

Yes. The methodology applies to both. Every technique is calibrated for age-appropriate interviewing at the K-12 level (including DASA) and for the higher-education context (including athletic Title IX and student conduct overlap). Same framework, adapted for the setting.

Does this course cover athletic Title IX?

Yes. Athletic compliance officers and senior women administrators handling Title IX in athletics face specific peer, coach, and institutional pressures. The course includes calibration for the athletic setting.

Who should attend this training?

Title IX Coordinators, Deputy Coordinators, athletic compliance officers, deans of students, conduct administrators handling Title IX-adjacent cases, K-12 principals and assistant principals, and any administrator whose Title IX findings have to survive appeal or OCR review. The course serves both new investigators and experienced staff updating their practice to current standards.

How is this different from generic Title IX training?

Most Title IX training tells administrators what they have to do. This course teaches them how to do it, specifically how to conduct an interview that produces reliable, uncontaminated information while satisfying Title IX standards for impartial treatment of complainants and respondents. The interview is where most institutions are exposed on appeal. This course closes that gap.

Does this course teach how to interview both complainants and respondents fairly?

Yes. Equal rigor for complainants and respondents is central to the course. Investigators learn to use the same disciplined methodology, open questions, contamination avoidance, structured documentation, across all interview types. This symmetry is essential for due process, litigation defense, and OCR-defensible practice.

What documentation standards does the course teach?

Investigators learn to produce contemporaneous notes and written summaries that capture interview content accurately, distinguish observation from inference, and create a record that withstands appellate review or litigation discovery. Documentation is treated as part of the interview, not an afterthought.

How do I bring this course to my institution?

The course is delivered on-site at your institution in one-day or two-day format. Contact ASC through the Request Training form or by calling (914) 489-2330 to discuss scheduling, audience size, and specific compliance focus (Title IX, DASA, athletic Title IX, or combinations).

Planning Details

What to expect, start to finish

Format

One-day course. Delivered open enrollment, closed to your team, or as a custom engagement.

Group size

Open enrollment fills from 10 paid attendees. Closed and custom deliveries carry no per-person minimum, at any group size.

Included

Attendee workbooks and reference cards, certificate of completion, in-class Q&A, and 30 days of post-course email support from Joe.

Credit & provider status

Advanced Strategic Communications is not an ATIXA-approved provider. This course is designed to pair with ATIXA administrator credentialing, not replace it. Case materials are handled FERPA-compliantly with identifying details sanitized. Scheduling is calibrated to academic calendars and Title IX team availability.

Travel

Built into the per-attendee rate for open enrollment, since regional attendees fill the room. Quoted separately at actual cost for closed and custom deliveries.

Booking & policy

Joe scopes every engagement personally and replies within one business day. See the full pricing and formats or the refund & cancellation policy.

Long-form analysis from the ASC Insights library

Title IX

Title IX Investigative Interviewing in 2026

Practical guide under the current regulatory landscape: interview-relevant requirements, common errors, and documentation standards that separate defensible findings from reversal on appeal.

Read → Trauma-Informed

How to Interview a Trauma-Exposed Victim Without Re-Traumatizing Them

Neurobiology of memory under stress, environmental setup, language choices, and documentation standards that hold up at trial.

Read →

Suppression Database

Case-law diagnostic of the interview-contamination patterns that overturn findings on appeal. Free to browse →

Browse All Insights →