The offender was a faculty member at Cape Breton University in Nova Scotia. The harassment began in February, when the lecturer asked the student if she wanted to be “friends with benefits” during an extracurricular study session, the Cape Breton Post reported.
The female student, who requested anonymity, told the Post she started to become “very uncomfortable with some of the questions he was asking, such as how many sexual partners we had, if we had ever done drugs or did crazy partying before.”
The student said the teacher asked her to bring him moose meat and lobster in exchange for better grades, which she did. Though she knew what she was doing was wrong, she admitted she had been struggling with daily tests that made up a significant portion of her final grade.
When the pair went to the woman’s car to collect the food, the lecturer demanded sex. “He claimed I had to do it, as my grades depended on it,” the woman explained. “He continued to say ‘Yes you will, you will do it,’ over and over, even though I made it clear to him at this point that I was very uncomfortable.”
The lecturer proposed going to a hotel or even his office at the university, telling the woman they could keep any relations a secret.
“I knew I was not going to sleep with this [instructor], but I also did not want to fail because he made it clear that if I did not [have sex], I would fail,” the student explained. She said she felt “fear because I was reporting him minutes after the incident happened, and I did not know the outcome.”
Regardless, she did not hesitate. “I immediately went to the only person who worked at the school that I knew,” the woman explained. “I knew that if I didn’t go right away, I would not be able to report him the next day…I felt that I would overthink it, I would go home right away and not say a word to anyone out of shame, and I would sleep on it and think of the potential consequences.”
Despite her fears, the student said the university was quick to respond and highly supportive. “Within the hour I reported him, I had spoken to the heads of departments, human resources, and student services,” she explained.
“This was a huge deal to them, and they made it very clear to me that they were going to help me through this every step of the way. He was suspended from teaching the next day.”
The student said she was “100 percent glad” that she overcame her fears and came forward, not least because she suspected “that I was not the first he had approached in this way.”
“He will never be able to approach any other vulnerable student at the university again,” she added. “I would not return to the school if I had to face him in the hallways.
CBU spokesperson Lenore Parsley told the Post that the university remains “committed to a safe and respectful campus for all of our community members…“Any and all complaints follow a formal process, as indicated in our respectful campus policy. We won’t be commenting further.”
