In an effort to reduce sexual assault on campus, the University of Southern California sent a campus-wide email asking students to complete a mandatory survey and Title IX course. Students who failed to complete the course by Feb. 9 would receive a "registration hold" until the training was complete, according to the University email obtained by Campus Reform.

This sort of online training course — and even the consequence of a registration hold — isn't out of the ordinary. But what stands out in the USC module is not the training course itself, but a mandatory survey that precedes it, in which students were asked to disclose information about their sexual histories. The survey has since drawn so much controversy that the university issued an apology and removed the personal questions from the course.

As American universities work to improve and shrink incredibly high rates of sexual assault, online courses like USC's that cover the parameters of Title IX, consent, and assault have become relatively common. The course sent out by USC actually comes from a company called CampusClarity that exists for the purpose of creating this sort of online course, and which provided the same course issued by USC to more than 200 other schools.

But the survey is less common. Screenshots of the survey obtained by Campus Reform show questions like, "How many times have you had sex (including oral) in the last 3 months," "How many different people have you had sex with (including oral) in the last 3 months," and "If you had sex (including oral) in the last 3 months, how many times had you used a condom?"

Campus Reform

USC students and random people on the Internet alike have expressed anger that USC would require its students to disclose such personal information. "It was just full of super personal questions," Jacob Ellenhorn, a student at USC, told Campus Reform.

This survey comes nearly a year after a nationwide survey was issued last spring by the Association of American Universities that 27 schools, including USC, chose to participate in. That survey also asked questions about sexual history, but the key difference is that it wasn't mandatory — universities could elect or decline to participate, and student participation wasn't mandatory either. There was no consequence for not participating, and all feedback was completely anonymous.

While requiring students to detail their personal, sexual experiences is definitely pretty shady, it's worth noting that the results of the AAU assault survey revealed USC to have one of the highest rates of campus sexual assault in the nation. Although participation in the survey was low at only 19.4 percent, an estimated 29.7 percent of female undergrads have experienced "some form of sexual assault or misconduct since attending the University."

Following the controversy surrounding the questionnaire, USC issued an apology to its students and removed the sexual history questions from the online course. The training module is still required but students no longer have to reveal details of their recent sexual past in order to register for classes.

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Hannah Smothers Hannah writes about health, sex, and relationships for Cosmopolitan, and you can follow her on Twitter and Instagram

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