Pitt takes action following Title IX inquiry
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
The University of Pittsburgh has disciplined an unspecified number of people associated with its Department of Communication after an investigation found violations of university policy and federal law against gender discrimination.
The investigation, triggered by past and recent allegations of sexual harassment and sexual relationships between staff and students, “found a consistent pattern in which women were not as valued and respected as their male colleagues,” said a statement by Kathleen M. Blee, dean of Pitt’s School of Arts and Sciences.
“This resulted in an environment in which the inappropriate acts of the few were tolerated by the silence of others,” she acknowledged.
“The investigations revealed failures of systems and failures of character,” her statement added.
“Those found to have engaged in behaviors that violated (federal anti-discrimination) Title IX and university policies have received disciplinary sanctions.”
Her statement did not say how many people were disciplined, nor did it say what actions they were being disciplined for or what their punishments were.
Pitt spokeswoman Deborah Todd said that under Pitt’s personnel policy, it was not divulging the specifics of the people involved or the alleged offenses.
The investigation covered events that began more than a decade ago, when an outside panel reviewing the department cited its tolerance for a culture in which faculty-student sexual relationships were common.
It also looked at the department’s current climate, which has received renewed scrutiny since the start of the #MeToo movement calling out perpetrators of sexual violence and harassment.
Former Communication Department professor Carol Stabile, who now chairs the Department of Women’s Studies at the University of Maryland, published an essay in December describing how she and others left Pitt due to a department “climate that was hostile to women and people of color.”
She said by email Thursday that the the proof of Pitt’s seriousness will involve “what steps Pitt is going to take to