As for the Rochester professors, it seems like a case of cutting off your nose to spite your face. If the professors feel that strongly about it, they should resign and go to work at other schools.
@simba9 Are you suggesting that the professors who filed the EEOC complaint should have just kept quiet and allow a situation that they found disturbingn to continue? I have a great deal of respect for them for taking a stand. And, while I think the boycott, which is actually an open letter to the UR trustees and pertains primarily to current or prospective grad students in BCS, has been taken out of context to some degree, it addresses a real problem.
However, I think it would be beyond naive to assume that Rochester is the only university where sexual harassment has been issue. Nor is it the only one where the administration has attempted to deal with it by covering it up rather than addressing it appropriately. Similar stories about Dartmouth, Berklee, and UW-Madison are in the news this week.
My recommendation would be to take this as a “wake up call”. Not just for Rochester but for higher education in general.
Finding another academic job simply isn’t that easy. More importantly, though, these professors chose to take a stand and improve the quality of their school rather than leave it to the wolves. People who love their institutions can change them for the better, not leave them to rot.
And @EllieMom - I absolutely agree with you. Rumors of professorial misconduct have been swirling around many institutions for decades. Rochester is just the first one to inspire this kind of collective action. I remember around the time I was entering graduate school, there were allegations against a famous Yale professor (I believe it was Harold Bloom) claiming he sexually harassed several female students. ([url=https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/yale-ethics-professor?utm_term=.pfE7KbGrx#.xtKJNDoz9]Here[/url] is a different one, concerning Thomas Pogge, found when I was searching for the first one.) I feel like every department has some rumors/tales of professors (usually male) messing with some of their graduate students (usually female, and usually third year or before; whether or not they are true is a different story). I even know a few married hetero couples in my field in which the romance began when the man was a professor and the woman was his graduate student.
And right now at my own alma mater (Spelman College) there’s a controversy swirling as well. This one concerns students, but the students allege that the college (along with Morehouse College, our immediate neighbor and a men’s college) has for years covered up allegations of rape and sexual assault of Spelman students by Morehouse students.
https://sites.google.com/site/openletterunivofrochester/ indicates nearly all of those signing the letter are not currently University of Rochester faculty. Of those who list direct connections to the University of Rochester:
- One is a visiting assistant professor.
- One is a fellow in the medical center.
- One is a retired professor.
- Four are alumni.
I.e. only seven out of 400 (or whatever) signatories have direct connections to the University of Rochester, of whom only two are currently working there.
It’s so hard to get a tenured track job and to get tenure - asking people to just look for other work is completely unrealistic. There are many fields were there are only one or two job openings a year and hundreds of people applying for the same job.
Ah yes, because change has always come from people who bravely, bravely ran away.
Seems like hardly anyone in this thread has noticed that the 400 or so signatories are nearly all faculty of other colleges and universities who are recommending that their students do graduate study someplace besides University of Rochester. Very few have any current connection to or employment at the University of Rochester.
Yes, this is a story about professors from around the world saying “We’ve heard the stories out of Rochester, and so we aren’t going to recommend our students apply for grad positions in that school.” It may be that they heard one person did resign in protest and took that as an indication that it was a serious situation, but there doesn’t seem to be other evidence of a problem. The school investigated and didn’t find fault…
…which I found strange as they did find that the prof had had an affair with one undergrad and one grad student, and that he’d rented a room to a student he supervised. I’d think those facts alone would be a violation of a professor’s code of conduct. I thought most schools had banned relationships, consensual or not, between students and teachers or supervisors.
@twoinanddone Some universities have a policy that it’s “frowned upon.” Many others do not state a policy on their website in a place that’s easily found. DD was touring Rochester just as the story was breaking in the national news, so I tried to research this a bit. The Rochester faculty senate last voted in 2015 not to prohibit faculty/student relationships.
@simba9 Some of the faculty involved in the EEOC complaint have indeed left. Some of the complaints were from grad students who left as well (at least one was unable to graduate.) I would assume other faculty members are trying to go but can’t. Job hunting in academia is tough to begin with, and this complaint will likely not make things easier.
I’m suggesting there are better ways to express your displeasure than telling students not to attend your school. If you’re a professor at Rochester and you think your school isn’t good enough for students, you shouldn’t be there, either.
To use the excuse of, “But it’s hard to get another job in academia” is a cop-out. If you really believe strongly in something, you’ll make some kind of sacrifice for it.
Again, you’re misinterpreting; the article is about professors at other institutions telling their students not to apply to Rochester for grad school, so they have no particular loyalty.
- Waging this type of battle is a huge sacrifice for those involved in the lawsuit.
- Leaving the school while the harassment continues is not a superior moral choice. It's leaving the problem for the next victims to deal with.
- Why should the victims lose their careers, and not the perpetrator?
The one thing that is absolutely bizarre about this case is the number of complaints and witnesses against the harasser versus how strongly both the department chair and the president of the university are supporting him.
I think harassment is fairly common at universities. And I think the other profs often know who it is at their school. It was an “open secret” at one of my kid’s schools about one of the profs who was too “touchy” with the students, made suggestive comments, etc, Her mentor profs knew – heck, the Dean of Faculty knew because more than one student (my kid included) had talked to him. The prof eventually retired – not sure if it was voluntary or not, but it was a few years after my kid complained.
When D2 was looking at grad schools, her advisor warned her off s few saying they are not good schools for women in her major. Now I wonder what he meant. Just hard to succeed due to sexism? Or does he know something else about bad actors there?
I’m a bit cynical – but I think it is easier to sign a letter about someone at another school than to deal with issues in your own department.
@intparent There is a blog keeping a running tally of legal findings of harassment. Google Geocognition Research Laboratory Not a fluke that case of academic sexual harassment
I think the ethical thing to do is to not send any students, male or female, to a department known for sexual harassment. Professors have a lot of say in where their students go due to the significance given to letters of recommendation in academia. In many scientific fields, most of the grad school candidates are men, so they are key to sending a message that sexual harassment will not be tolerated.
No, you’re misinterpreting what I said. I said in my very first comment on the issue, “As for the Rochester professors.” I did that so people would know I was limiting my comments to the professors who taught at Rochester. Maybe that was too subtle for people to notice.
Simply telling students not to attend the university is not a sacrifice for the professors involved. According to the article, one Rochester professor resigned. I have a lot of respect for him because he stood up for his convictions. The other Rochester professors won’t, and I have little respect for them. And professors at other universities risk nothing by telling their students to avoid Rochester.
Having the conviction to leave the school sends a stronger message to the administration than telling students not to attend, precisely because it’s a sacrifice.
The professors complaining weren’t the victims. And apparently, a lot of the other professors at Rochester are pretty annoyed with the ones who are complaining because they’re losing graduate students. That tells me the other professors don’t think the complainers are justified in their actions.
Your whole post indicates that you have not been following this story as closely as I have.
Complainants no longer at UR: Aslin, Newport, Bixby, Hayden.
Still at UR: Cantlon, Kidd, Mahon, Piantadosi.
@AroundHere, interesting resource on legal findings. Unfortunately, women are still reluctant to complain about their grad advisors. It is still more likely to ruin their careers than not.
I was talking to D2 about this over the weekend. She is a first year PhD student and has started narrowing in on a lab/PI for her research, and has been spending some time in the lab. She said she does not get any “creepy vibe” from the PI, but one of the two full time (not student) men in the lab is someone she said she’d rather not be alone with. Fortunately he isn’t working in her immediate area of interest.
Wow – Search for that Google Geocognition resource – I looked for Google Geocognition sexual harrassment. I guess it is a blog, so can’t post the link. Once you get in, there is a link in the text to “this list” – 571 cases with schools, result, and article links. I’m only partway through the list – just came across a resource that traded financial aid for sexual favors. >:P
And the one where the prof hired a hit man to kill his accuser (fortunately did not succeed).
My d is a U or R alum, class of 2010 and did have elective class in that department as part of a cluster sequence. She told me that she never heard of any of the names of the faculty members or grad students involved in this ongoing situation. As an alum she received a letter from President Seligman detailing the allegations, the situation when first reported in Mother Jones, the steps that the University was taking with the Mary Jo White investigation that was very forthcoming. While I am not condoning this professor sexual harassment in any form, trust me that any university in which there are not faculty members/graduate assistants is unfortunately a rarity. This petition with many signers from individual faculty members at many universities seems to exacerbate not resolve an ongoing situation especially as it will be misconstrued. While the BSC department is a leader in the field with many research opportunities for grad students and post-doc students you are still talking about a fairly limited group of people who are in the process of applying for grad school placement.