A modest proposal

I was happy to read in Tuesday’s article, “Sexual assault policy changes raise questions,” that the Office of Student Conduct is finally taking steps to create a uniform harassment policy. Instead of extending the statute of limitations for sexual misconduct and harassment from one year to two, the Office has decided to reduce the statute of limitations for sexual assault and rape from two years to one. As Dean Bryan himself writes, “I have reviewed all sexual misconduct cases reported to my office for disciplinary action over the past 10 academic years, and 96 percent were reported in less than a year after the incident.” This reduction to the statute of limitations would have only affected 4 percent of all reports! For students who are concerned about the change in policy, do they really want the statute of limitations to be set at one year seven months 23 days fours hours and 51 minutes (which to my understanding is the longest time a survivor has taken to file a report)? We should be happy, in fact grateful, for achieving 96 percent efficiency; not many production lines achieve that these days.

At the same time, critics of this policy change do not realize the external benefits that can come out of the current scenario. For one, by reducing the statute of limitations, we can address the problem of underreporting in cases of sexual violence. It is clear that underreporting is the result of survivors taking their own sweet time in coming forth and reporting, and if we force survivors to be more efficient, more cases can be reported and sexual assault will be recognized as a legitimate problem on campus (if it even is in the first place). In addition, not all sexual assaults are deliberate acts of violence; some perpetrators just made honest mistakes in coercing others to have non-consensual sex with them. A reduction in the statute of limitations would allow these misunderstood individuals to continue their education without interruption—while I believe no student has ever been expelled by the University for committing sexual assault, some students have faced suspension and have been forced to spend a few semesters away.

I modestly propose that since the Office of Student Conduct is already implementing this policy change, it might as well go just a few steps further and mandate that all victims of sexual assault present their cases before the Student Conduct Board before the end of the next working day following their alleged assaults. More time for “healing” and “recovery” is simply a luxury as the University seeks to solve the problem of sexual assault as soon as it possibly can. Besides, we already have sufficient support services through the Women’s Center, Counseling and Psychological Services and Duke Wellness that allow survivors of sexual violence to file reports for disciplinary action in a timely and efficient manner, should they decide to. Of course, a student would have more time to prepare his or her case if the alleged assault happened on a weekend; he or she would appear before the Board by 5 p.m. Monday. People need to realize that the University certainly has its students’ best interests at heart.

Ming Jiu Li

Pratt ’12