“Often in the course of an investigation, lots gets resolved,” she said.

And while students acknowledge that the changed evidence requirement is a significant improvement, it is still flawed, they say.

“It my opinion it doesn’t matter what they call it,” said Ellenor J. Honig ’04. “I don’t like either way. They should take all cases no matter what.”

And Neuhaus-Follini, who said that CASV’s biggest concern has always been that each student is granted a full hearing and investigation, said this change is important.

“This seems to have the effect of granting people a more thorough investigation,” she said. “My opinion has always been that there should be no evidentiary threshold.”

But despite her optimism about the proposed changes, Nehaus-Follini said that she is hesitant to praise the policy completely.

“A fact finder is an important step but it is also important who that fact finder is,” she said.

For that, Neuhaus-Follini said they are awaiting an approval of the recommendation of the recent findings of the Leaning Committee, which will be presented to the full Faculty at its May 6 meeting.

But despite the wealth of new recommendations, Honig said that neither the changed Handbook wording nor the independent fact finder will fix Harvard’s policy entirely.

“It seems like changing the way they are looking at things,” she said. “This is slightly better, but nothing will really be resolved much unless something happens in a big way with the qualifications of the members of the Ad Board.”

—Staff writer Jessica E. Vascellaro can be reached at vascell@fas.harvard.edu.