Brittany Lovely is expecting her first child in early December. Her final exams at Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, DC, are scheduled around the same time.
So she was surprised when she asked the school if she could take the exams at another time and was denied.
“I really wasn’t trying to get anything crazy to happen,” Lovely said. “I asked if I could take the exam early.”
The law center’s fall exam schedule runs from December 6-13, with a window of December 16-18 listed as possible deferral exam dates. The deferral dates are used in various instances, such as if a student falls ill, a death in the family or if a student gives birth to a child during or immediately before the exam period, the university’s website states.
Lovely said her pregnancy due date is December 2, and her in-person exam is scheduled for December 13.
Firstborn babies are less likely to arrive on time. They’re either early or late, studies have found, CNN previously reported. Lovely, who is having her first child, falls into that category, meaning it’s possible her baby could come after the designated deferral dates.
Lovely is Black, and noted the striking Black maternal mortality rates in DC. While Black people constitute roughly half of all births in DC, they account for 90% of all pregnancy-related deaths, according to data from the District of Columbia’s Maternal Mortality Review Committee.
Facing an untenable situation, Lovely asked for help.
Trying to cut through red tape
In September, she spoke with a university Title IX official who was, “fabulous and supportive,” to her requests for help, Lovely said. Title IX, is the 1972 federal law prohibiting sex-based discrimination at schools receiving federal aid, according to the US Department of Education.
The Title IX official and Lovely came up with two options: to take the exam early when the finals period opened or take it at the same time as everyone else in the class but from home, which would likely be a few days after giving birth.
Both options, which the Title IX official gave to the registrar and the Office of Academic Affairs, were denied, Lovely said.
Lovely asked the Title IX official if she could meet with the officials who denied the request. On October 15, Lovely said she met with school officials via Zoom to talk about the reasoning for the denials.
In her meeting, officials cited the university’s honor code and a school-wide policy prohibiting anyone from taking exams early, Lovely said. The school has not confirmed the meetings or what was discussed.
“The meeting was horrible,” Lovely said. “They said that I had to come in person no matter what, to take this exam, and the only times that I could take it were between the 13th and the 18th, with the possibility with emergency circumstance to extend it to the morning of the 20th.”
Officials also suggested Lovely could have someone sit outside the exam room with her newborn baby so she could take breaks while taking the test, to breastfeed, she said.
In early November, Lovely said she tried again to get her accommodations met, this time by drafting a legal memo outlining Title IX, the Americans with Disabilities Act and citing what she had been through.
Lovely sent the memo to the law school dean on November 10. She said the dean responded, saying he did not handle pregnancy adjustments, and pointed her back to the Title IX official. The school did not comment on the response.
Finally, a breakthrough
After the frustration of trying to make progress with a lone voice, Lovely’s friends pressed the issue, bringing in thousands of voices.
A few of Lovely’s friends put together a petition to support her request for accommodation on her final exams. Lovely said the petition has now reached more than 7,000 students, faculty, alumni and community members across the country.
“I was really trying to solve this in a very nonadversarial way. It feels so fresh,” Lovely said.
On Friday, the school decided to open an extra deferral date in January, aligned with the deferral timelines of previous years, Lovely said.
The resolution was reached, “only after all of the public outcry,” Lovely said.
When reached by CNN, a university spokesperson would not confirm Lovely’s account of the challenges she encountered, nor whether she will be allowed to take exams in January, or the timing of a decision.
“Georgetown is committed to providing a caring, supportive environment for pregnant and parenting students. We have reached a mutually agreeable solution with the student who raised concerns,” the spokesperson said.
“Georgetown offers academic and practical resources to assist in the completion of a student’s degree while they are pregnant or parenting including pregnancy related adjustments from the Office of Title IX Compliance, and disability accommodations from our Academic Resource Center. Georgetown does not publicly comment on the specifics of individual student matters,” the spokesperson added.
Lovely hopes the school will implement policy changes going forward.
“What I really would like to see is the school, and I guess law schools generally, to like to see their role in supporting their students and really show up,” she said. “I would expect a policy change at this point from the school, just to make sure that nobody else ever has to go through something like this again.”
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