American colleges have a massive rape problem and there's no clear solution in sight

• American colleges are failing on the issue of sexual assault investigations.
• They've ramped up policies over the past decade but still let down both victims and the accused with their rulings and punishments.
• At their worst, weak sexual assault policies allow serial abusers to remain on campus and assault victims.

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American colleges have a rape problem.

They're not going to solve it anytime soon. It's clear they don't know how.

Over the past decade, universities have clamped down on sexual assault on campuses at the federal government's urging. They've offered students an alternative to reporting incidents to police.

Instead, students can file complaints with the schools, go through a much faster trial-like process, and receive a ruling that will make their assailants disappear from campus.

But the system fails both women and men.

Schools issue weak punishments for heinous incidents

When a school decides it has enough evidence that a rape occurred, assailants don't go to jail. Schools don't have that power. Plus, they use a lower standard of proof than criminal courts. Their rulings hold no weight except on their own campuses.

Instead, accused students might get kicked off campus for a couple semesters. Occasionally, they're expelled. Many who are deemed to have committed wrongdoing against fellow students are allowed back on campus, graduate, and join the workforce.

A Business Insider investigation into Yale University's process found that more than 60 students in the past seven years filed formal complaints of sexual misconduct to the school.

In 15 cases, Yale found that "penetration without consent," "nonconsensual sex," or "intercourse without consent" occurred.

Only five of the Yale-deemed assailants were expelled. The 10 others were suspended, put on probation, or given a written reprimand.

That's right: Yale issued a mere written reprimand after corroborating allegations that a Yale student had non-consensual sex with a female student.

Yale's punishment tells students that even when administrators determine someone to be a sexual assailant, they're fine to return to campus. Yale's internal reports define sexual assault to include any kind of nonconsensual sexual contact, "including rape."

And for the accused, who have often not been legally convicted of anything, a school's decision can destroy their reputations among peers and haunt them the rest of their lives.

Colleges botch assault hearings

The weak response of colleges when it comes to sexual assault is just one side of the coin. Schools also botch sexual assault hearings, with reputation and potentially career-destroying consequences for the accused.

Trials at universities are relatively quick, and the amount of evidence needed to reach a decision is much different than the standard needed in court. So the verdict a school reaches might be different than if a court were to prosecute a rape.

There are legitimate reasons colleges should run sexual assault investigations and hearings differently than a criminal court. Schools have a duty to ensure their campuses are safe places for all to pursue their academic endeavors, and quickly.

But that doesn't give colleges a pass to deny students their constitutional rights. Lawmakers and legal experts across the ideological spectrum, from Betsy DeVos to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, have serious reservations about the way schools investigate campus assault. Schools increasingly face legal action from students accused of sexual assault for infringing on their right to due process.

In the face of mounting pressure to fix sexual assault proceedings, schools seem to take the path of least resistance to protect themselves from scrutiny, rather than genuinely work to improve their processes.

They issue middling rulings that seem to say, We kind of believe the victim but we don't want to get sued, so let's split the difference.

Another issue: colleges conduct their proceedings largely in secret. It leaves everyone except a small circle of university appointees with virtually no understanding of how the process works and what rulings truly mean.

At their worst, the shortcomings in schools' sexual assault procedures can actually allow the abuse to fester.

Michigan State University's bungling of a sexual assault investigation against Larry Nassar is a prime example. In 2014, the school received a complaint from a student that Nassar massaged her breasts and vagina during medical treatment. Still, the university's investigation determined that Nassar's behavior was "medically appropriate."

When the true scope of Nassar's abuse came to light, it became one of the biggest sexual abuse cases in the history of sports.

His nightmarish abuse ended four years later, only after a legal process began outside of the school's jurisdiction. Nassar was sentenced up to 175 years in prison after pleading guilty to multiple counts of sexual assault.

It's morally imperative for colleges to fix this

Rape incidents are some of the hardest to investigate, both for colleges and legal authorities.

There's often no physical evidence of the assault, victims don't always share details with anyone after an attack, and alcohol often adds a complication.

But figuring out a better system is not just a college's responsibility - it's a moral imperative. Certain policy changes, like removing barriers to open communication, are easy to implement and could have immediate benefits.

And its puzzling why, if a school finds evidence of a rape, the case isn't then escalated to legal authorities to investigate.

A common frustration among both victims and the accused is that they don't know how to navigate convoluted university hearings. Colleges must invite greater transparency in their sexual-assault processes and findings.

American universities are revered organizations and thought leaders that produce Nobel laureates, business innovators, and world leaders. Yet sexual assailants are often slipping through the cracks.

If these institutions, with billions of dollars and tagged as charitable organizations, can't be trusted to at least move the conversation forward, why should families continue to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to send their children there?

As long as colleges continue to do just the bare minimum to protect themselves, rather than students, nothing will change.

And their actions indicate that's all they plan on doing for now.

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This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Business Insider.