Allan Hancock College revisited its nondiscrimination and harassment policies on April 10, two months after a longtime employee publicly described to the board of trustees her experience of being sexually harassed and retaliated against.
Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement Program (MESA) Coordinator Christine Reed said at a meeting on Feb. 13 that the harassment she endured should not be allowed on Hancock’s campus.
“It was an act of intimidation,” Reed said at the meeting. “It was a threat. It was a misogynistic attack on my personal character, my sexual identity, and my integrity as a professional educator. It has led me to question my safety on this campus, and I have gone to lengths to avoid any contact with the individual who committed this act.”
Although Reed declined to comment further on the incident, she said her case was investigated by Hancock after she filed a formal complaint through its Human Resources department. Still, Reed called on the board of trustees to adopt a “no tolerance” position at Hancock that would protect employees and students from abusive situations like hers.
“Behavior demonstrated by the employee who sexually harassed me is a threat to our college values and safety of all students and employees,” Reed said. And her experience, she said, should not be considered an isolated incident.
A study published in 2016 by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission found that at least 25 percent of U.S. women have experienced harassment in the workplace. The commission estimates that 75 percent of all workplace harassment incidents go unreported.
Susan Houghton, executive director of Hancock College Advancement, told the Sun that while all sexual misconduct complaints are investigated, some can be handled informally, meaning not all complaints result in “findings.”
“I can tell you anecdotally that we, from an employee and a student standpoint, we have seen the #MeToo movement have an increase in the number of people who want to talk to us,” Houghton said. “But not all of those are forwarded. Not all of those go to the Chancellor’s Office if they’re not a Title IX complaint.”
The Title IX Office investigates all forms of sexual misconduct, from situations involving unwanted sexual comments to stalking and domestic violence.
“We take every situation very seriously,” Hancock Vice President of Student Services and Title IX Coordinator Nohemy Ornelas told the Sun on April 12.
While Hancock College officials were initially reticent to give the Sun statistics from its Title IX Office, the college eventually responded to a Public Records Act request. Hancock investigated two Title IX complaints in 2015, four in 2017, and one so far in 2018. There were no Title IX complaints made in 2014 or 2016, according to the data.
According to a spring 2016 American College Health Association assessment, nearly 4 percent of Hancock students reported having experienced sexual touching without their consent in the 12 months prior to 2016. Nearly 6 percent of Hancock students said they’d been stalked, according to the assessment, and 3 percent reported having been in a physically abusive relationship.
Citywide, the Santa Maria Police Department investigated 62 reports of forcible rape in 2017 alone, according to data available on the department’s website. But there were no reports of sex offenses that occurred on or off campus made to the Hancock College Police Department from 2014 to 2016, according to the department’s most recent crime statistics. Hancock Police received only one domestic violence report in those three years.
It’s not uncommon for survivors of sexual violence and harassment to forgo the legal reporting process, according to Deborah Redding-Stewart, a mental health counselor with Hancock Student Health Services.
That’s why awareness and outreach events like the Clothesline Project are so important, Redding-Stewart said.
More than 50 community members participated in Hancock’s local adaptation of the national Clothesline Project on April 9 in the spirit of Sexual Assault Awareness Month. There, attendees wrote phrases like, “No = no,” and, “No more,” on T-shirts that were then pinned to a clothesline outside the student center.
“I think the main thing with the clothesline project is that it helps them break the silence and begin the healing process,” Redding-Stewart said. “The idea is to bear witness to violence against women, to educate people about that, and to find a path for healing for individuals who have been in those situations.”
For many survivors, that path is mental health counseling. Redding-Stewart said Hancock offers students 10 free counseling sessions each semester. Although campus counselors don’t usually offer their services to employees, Redding-Stewart said she sees students every day who have experienced some form of domestic or sexual violence.
Individuals who want to pursue disciplinary action can also report sexual violence and harassment incidents to Hancock’s Title IX Office, Redding-Stewart said.
While Hancock’s board of trustees is currently working on new and revised harassment and nondiscrimination policies for students and employees, Houghton from Student Advancement said the decision to update those policies was not a response to Reed’s call for a no-tolerance stance.
“We typically have all of our board policies reviewed on either an annual or biannual basis as necessary, especially if they need to be updated,” Houghton said. “It’s not uncommon to have board policies updated. We have, every single month, some board policies that come back.”
The board completed its first reading on April 10 of revisions to Board Policy and Administrative Procedure 3410, which establishes Hancock’s nondiscrimination guidelines.
“We do not have a no-tolerance policy on harassment, per se, on a resolution standpoint,” Houghton said. “We have a no-tolerance policy on retaliation. We also have a no-tolerance policy in terms of the need to investigate.”
The policies were reworked to include gender identity, gender expression, genetic information, and veteran or military status to Hancock’s list of characteristics that cannot be discriminated against. They also now state that Hancock will provide equal access to its employment opportunities, along with its services, classes, and programs.
Two new administrative procedures—3435 and 3430—that prohibit harassment and establish guidelines for harassment and discrimination investigations were also read for the first time on April 10.
Both procedures, which include pages of detailed guidelines for employees experiencing harassment or discrimination, were just two of 14 administrative procedures and board policies reviewed by various Hancock entities as of March, according to Andrew Masuda, director of Hancock Public Affairs and Communications. Masuda said that while Hancock had a clear statement against harassment and discrimination, as well as guidelines for handling reported cases of sexual misconduct, specific administrative procedures establishing those guidelines did not exist until this year.
Masuda said the procedures will most likely be officially adopted by the board of trustees next month.
Staff Writer Kasey Bubnash can be reached at [email protected].
