“Cover your
ass (CYA) or cover
your own ass (CYOA) describes professional and organizational
practices that serve to protect oneself from legal and administrative
penalties, criticism, or other punitive measures.”
“A Rape Response Gone
Wrong”
“It is a Sunday afternoon, the
Sunday after Thanksgiving, and Fran Lindau gets a call. A student on the
semester-long study abroad program she directs in Monteverde, Costa Rica, has
been raped during a weekend trip to the beach. A friend of the assaulted woman
is calling: she does not wish to go to a clinic, but could Lindau arrange for
her to get emergency contraception?”
“From here things are set in motion. After doing some research,
including calling a doctor in the U.S. and accessing a Princeton
University-sponsored website
on emergency contraception, Lindau and her fellow professor and partner
Catherine Murray obtain an over-the-counter packet of birth control pills,
which can be used in high dosages for emergency contraceptive purposes, as the
product known as Plan B is not a legal drug in Costa Rica. Murray purchases the
birth control while Lindau drives to the beach to pick up the victim and three
other students who had accompanied her there. Upon returning to
Monteverde, Lindau asks again if the victim will go to a clinic; again,
she declines. Lindau gives her the birth control pills with instructions on the
appropriate dosage -- four pills now, another four in twelve hours – and asks her
to come to her office first thing in the morning.”
“It is not until lunchtime the next day, until after Lindau has
had the opportunity to interview the student and her three friends, that she
reports the incident to her supervisor, the executive director of the
Monteverde Institute (MVI), Debra Hamilton. Lindau will be reprimanded for this
delay, as well as her unauthorized efforts to assist the victim in procuring
over-the-counter medication (more on this below); she gets fired Dec. 18.
Murray resigns 12 days later, under pressure, after both she and Hamilton
express doubts that their working relationship could be remedied by mediation.”
“Yet from Lindau and Murray’s perspectives – and the rape
survivor's, too – it was only after the incident was reported to Hamilton that
it began to be mishandled. The victim felt harassed by Hamilton into signing a
legal waiver and was distressed by her insistence that Monteverde staff would
have to report the crime against her wishes – which Hamilton said was her legal
obligation though she stressed that neither the victim’s name nor any details
of the assault were shared with the police.”
Please read the whole story here and share: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/02/13/case-costa-rica-illustrates-complexities-responding-sexual-assault-study-abroad
Also, please read the victims own words here: http://thetransientbiologist.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/open-letter-re-incident-1.pdf
Where to begin on this one: this sort of scenario is not new, but
with the growth of electronic media we are able to get informed more readily
now. The big universal question is: when dos CYA go too far?
The culture f sexual assault in educational settings is already
too large; however, this culture could not exist without a culture of bureaucratic
cover-up supporting it! Time and time again, we hear about the victim being
victimized twice, the second time coming from clueless, heartless
administrators.
Do we not get it? Do we not understand that this is a bad thing and
it must stop? This is a shameful stain on education.
Think about our students first, those past, those present, and
those if the future.
Dr Flavius A B Akerele III
The ETeam
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