HANOVER — A faculty group at Dartmouth College released a statement on Tuesday calling for new leadership in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, following the departure last summer of three professors amid allegations of sexual misconduct.
The Dartmouth chapter of the American Association of University Professors, a Washington-based faculty advocacy group, echoes other Dartmouth community groups in calling for administrators to place the department in academic receivership by appointing external leadership.
“A department that does not provide even the most basic conditions for scholarly inquiry is not fit to govern itself,” the Dartmouth AAUP group wrote in a Tuesday statement on its website. “In the case of the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, gender harassment and sexual violence have not been fully addressed.”
The group said that its members continue to hear “reports of retaliation, intimidation, and ongoing fear of sexual predation” in the department, so academic receivership is necessary to protect students, post-doctoral researchers and junior faculty members.
Groups that have previously made the call for the department to be placed in academic receivership include the Student and Presidential Committee on Sexual Assault, a group of students and staff that conducts research and makes policy recommendations around sexual violence, and the Dartmouth Community Against Gender Harassment and Sexual Violence, a coalition of alumni, students and faculty.
In response to previous calls for academic receivership, the college has said that it is conducting climate reviews of all the departments on campus.
The AAUP’s call comes days after Dartmouth and the plaintiffs in a $70 million class-action lawsuit that alleges the college turned a blind eye to the professors’ misconduct said they are working to settle the dispute out of court.