Getting Past The Ad Board

Today’s release of the report of the Committee to Address Sexual Assault at Harvard (CASAH) marks an important milestone in the effort to prevent sexual assault on campus. The recommendation to create an Office of Sexual Assault Prevention and Response, the call for increased education and training services for students and staff and the focus on coordination of services—as advocated in this space over the last two days—are extremely promising signs. On Monday, this space will feature a full review of the CASAH report. But today we will address the one area of sexual assault that CASAH was specifically prevented from reforming: The Administrative Board of the College.

According to extrapolated data from the most recent University Health Services survey, 58 students—enough to fill seven blocking groups—were raped at Harvard last year. Yet the Ad Board only investigated seven cases.

There are many reasons why these incidents might not come before the full Ad Board. In some cases, survivors may not feel comfortable pressing disciplinary action against their assailants. Others may prefer to skip the campus judicial procedures and bring their charges in criminal court instead. In too many cases the reason students are reluctant to turn to the Ad Board for help is that the majority of them has no clear understanding of its policies. More importantly, students have little faith in the organization itself, and in many respects, they have little reason to.

The Ad Board—currently responsible for deciding cases of sexual assault—is mainly comprised of senior tutors and assistant deans of the College who have no training, education or background in either sexual assault or specialized methods for investigating it. Over the years, numerous calls have been made to train the members of the board about sexual assault, but the refrain that the board’s members are “too busy” has been constant. Today’s call by CASAH’s to train Ad Board members in peer-to-peer dispute resolution methods is a positive change, but training in procedure is more effective when it is accompanied by sexual assault training.

But as a practical matter, the Ad Board members are some of the most overworked officials at the College. Indeed, they truly do not have the time necessary to fully handle even the seven cases of sexual assault that it heard last year—a number that administrators have characterized as a “dramatic” increase over previous years. As far as qualifications, Assistant Dean of the College and Secretary of the Ad Board David B. Fithian claims that the board is qualified to hear these cases because its members come from academic backgrounds that “value inquiry.” But this reasoning simply reinforces the dangerous perception that no prerequisite knowledge about sexual assault is needed for adequate consideration of its treatment. There is no doubt that the members are individually well-meaning, but the expectation that this group of overextended and under-trained officials can create a process that adequately addresses sexual assault is flawed in its premise. This is why this process needs to be abandoned.

Cases of sexual assault must be considered by a separate disciplinary board that includes some faculty and administrators, but is mainly comprised of officials trained in sexual assault, judicial procedure, mental health, investigative techniques and other student support services.

Only when Harvard commits to assembling a group of serious sexual assault professionals to consider cases will students take its determinations seriously. Only by stepping up the level of expertise of the adjudicating body will Harvard be able to increase students’ confidence in the fairness of the board and make students feel confident in appealing to it for justice. The College must provide a trained, competent disciplinary board with the power to remove rapists from the Harvard community.

While creating a new board is the cornerstone that must come from a more comprehensive review of the disciplinary procedure, there are other steps that can be taken to improve adjudication. CASAH’s recommendation to enforce last spring’s proposal to create a “Single Fact Finder” (SFF) for Ad Board investigations is a step in the right direction. But while there is inherent value in consolidating the investigation process—so that survivors don’t have to painfully retell their accounts to various officials—any successful SFF must be completely separate from the University’s administration. Under the current Ad Board set up, each student’s adviser in the discipline board is that student’s senior tutor. But students may feel uncomfortable confiding in the same officials who are responsible for writing their graduate school recommendations, and, in cases where the complainant and respondent are in the same House, may have a relationship with the other party.

And while giving fact-finding responsibility to one individual—instead of a subcommittee of the Ad Board—can ease scheduling complications and reduce the time it takes to complete an investigation, it is essential that the SFF be uniquely qualified to design investigations that are sensitive to the emotions of the survivor and alleged assailant as well.

With a SFF streamlining the investigation timetable, it is the responsibility of the judiciary body to undertake full investigations of every incident brought before it, abandoning any limiting evidentiary litmus test—such as requirements of “independent corroborating evidence” or “supporting information.” And while the College should be frank with students about the likely outcomes of cases they might bring forward and advise them of the advantages and disadvantages of using the criminal courts, survivors must still empowered to chart their own courses.

None of these reforms, however, will change student perception of assault unless the administration more effectively explains its policies to students. In last year’s Crimson survey of more than 400 undergraduates, 70 percent of respondents said that they did not understand how the current Ad Board handles sexual assault, and 56 percent said that the board handles cases poorly. These negative perceptions, while arguably justified, have only been exacerbated by the secrecy with which Harvard masks it proceedings. The institution of the “corroboration rule”—which remained poorly defined for months after its proposal—further eroded students’ belief in Ad Board transparency. The University must be more forthcoming with information about sexual assault on campus. While protecting confidentiality, UHS must release the number of sexual violence cases it treats, tutors and deans must share how many students they counsel about these issues each year and any new sexual assault board must report its aggregate statistics about its potential cases, investigated cases, decided cases and punishments in a timely manner. These vital statistics can provide useful information to students.

And communication must flow both ways. Education programs, survivor services and a newly constituted sexual assault board must each create mechanisms to hear feedback from students and improve their programs and policies accordingly. This feedback piece is crucial because unless officials can have a firm grasp of how their services are viewed by the student body, students will again lose faith in the institutions meant to help them.

CASAH’s report provides the first great potential for reform in a decade. The last time the College reviewed sexual assault was in 1991 with the Date Rape Task Force. More than a dozen years ago, this last group concluded that:

“[A better remedy] requires that those members of the institution who hear cases of allegations of rape and sexual assault should receive thorough training; it also requires that colleges establish clear guidelines for a procedure that recognizes the serious nature of the charge with which it is dealing, provides fair process, treats victims with sensitivity, and creates the fullest opportunity for a hearing of the facts leading to a finding and, when a finding is made, an appropriate sanction.”

It is our hope that CASAH’s recommendations, as well as the attention to the issue it has been able to garner, will turn the dreams of past decades into a reality. The trauma that sexual assault survivors have endured at Harvard demands no less.