Seven women sue Dartmouth, alleging sexual assault in 'Animal House' climate

Seven women accuse Dartmouth College in a lawsuit of allowing three prominent professors to harass and sexually assault students in a “21st-century Animal House” atmosphere.

For more than a decade, the lawsuit contends, female students in the school’s Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences “have been treated as sex objects by tenured professors Todd Heatherton, William Kelley, and Paul Whalen. These professors leered at, groped, sexted, intoxicated, and even raped female students.”

The lawsuit describes a culture in which well-regarded professors who helped build a powerhouse department at the Ivy League school acted with impunity and repeatedly mistreated students who were dependent on their academic support. It asserts that professors regularly held professional lab meetings in bars, invited students to late-night hot-tub parties, and conditioned academic support on participation in a hard-drinking party culture and tolerance of unwanted sexual attention.

“This was an open secret,” said Andrea Courtney, one of the plaintiffs, who earned her doctorate at Dartmouth. “This was happening in front of everyone, in the department, in the town of Hanover, at academic conferences -- these men had reputations as . . . gropers and predators. It was very widely known, yet no one in positions of power stepped up to do anything to change that.”

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2018/11/15/seven-women-sue-dartmouth-alleging-sexual-assault-animal-house-climate/