PEA Reacts to Sexual Misconduct Survey
The Exonian sent a survey on sexual misconduct and the sexual climate on campus to all members of the student body two weeks ago. The survey showed that a large proportion of the students were mistrusting of the school, and were unconfident in the school’s ability to handle sexual assault cases.
612 of 1060 students completed the survey, giving it a relatively high response rate of 57.7 percent. 122 of them were preps, 145 lowers, 161 uppers and 187 seniors. 51.62 percent of respondents identified as female and 45.78 percent as male, while 2.6 percent of respondents identified as either agender, genderqueer, genderfluid or nonbinary.
The distrust towards the Academy reflected in the survey was upsetting to many students. 54 percent of respondents reported that there was a sexual misconduct problem at Exeter. 60 percent said that, if they or a friend were a survivor of sexual misconduct, they would feel either unconfident or very unconfident that the school would properly handle the situation. 51 percent said that in such a situation they would feel either uncomfortable or very uncomfortable going to a counselor.
“Knowing that there are 63 victims on my campus gave me a weird feeling in my stomach… They have to walk around campus with that burden and nobody knows.”
Interim Dean of Student Wellbeing Tina Sciocchetti acknowledged the need for continued progress regarding the relationship between the Academy and its students and the sexual climate on campus. “We continue to build in this area and know there is still work to be done to improve the culture on campus and the students’ faith in the Academy’s response,” she said.
However, 63 respondents identified as sexual misconduct victims; five reported their cases. 47 of them answered that they would not consider coming forward.
“It is shocking and saddening that the grand majority of sexual assault victims do not consider coming out to the school,” upper Francis Baviera Maloney said. “Clearly the administration has a lot of work to do to be able to regain the trust of the students.”
Principal Lisa MacFarlane, too, was troubled by the survey’s results, and acknowledged that there is still room for growth. “Every adult on campus--and especially me--is concerned that many students who responded to the Exonian poll feel that they don’t have confidence in the school handling sexual assault cases. It is really important for us to understand why these students feel this way,” she added.
Sciocchetti acknowledged some respondents’ decision not to come forward. “To the extent the results actually reflect a reluctance to report sexual misconduct, I strongly encourage anyone who believes he or she has been a victim of assault to come forward,” she said.
MacFarlane agreed. “We are committed to providing support and fair responses to survivors… We encourage survivors and their friends and allies to come forward to a trusted adult,” she said.
Senior Tayo Zenger, chair of social media outreach for the club Exonians Against Sexual Assault (EASA), was surprised by the prevalence of sexual misconduct among Exonians. “Knowing that there are 63 victims on my campus gave me a weird feeling in my stomach… They have to walk around campus with that burden and nobody knows.”
Zenger also said he was distressed by the distrust the victims felt towards the administration. “There are people in my community, teenagers, that are going through something that nobody should have to ever go through. That they feel uncomfortable coming forward about it concerned me greatly.”
Senior Jesús Rivera also found the lack of trust reflected in the survey disturbing. “The fact that over half of the people that answered this survey don’t trust the school to handle a sexual misconduct situation is appalling to me. That statistic signifies to me that the amount of grievances about mishandled cases must be high, and that to me is unacceptable,” he said.
The responses were unsurprising to some students. Upper CJ Penn said that the distrust towards the Academy expressed in the survey results were reflective of his own sentiments. “I feel like the administration is something I can not place any trust in or go to for anything,”
Rivera also observed a similar suspicion towards the school. “The amount of mistrust towards the administration is not startling to me. I think that kids here believe that the administration has a history of covering itself rather than attempting to help kids in need.”
Senior Claire Dauge-Roth, President of EASA, also observed a wariness towards the school’s administration. “There’s a sentiment [among students] that the administration is kind of trying to cover something up” she said.
Upper Mila DeGuere, Chair of policy and student involvement for the EASA, felt that the distrust stemmed from The Boston Globe’s coverage of the Academy. “Regardless of whether what is said in [The Boston Globe’s coverage of sexual misconduct at Exeter] is actually what happened, it painted the administration as a group who aren’t really catering to the victim.” However, the mistrust reported in the survey may not be reflective of all Exonians’ experiences. “I’ve worked closely with lots of faculty in discussing [sexual misconduct] and what they say and how they act seems to be different than the way the article described,” DeGuere said.
Interim co-Director of Student Well-being Tina Sciocchetti questioned the effectiveness and fairness of the questions used in the survey. Referring specifically to the question on students approaching counselors, phrased, “If you were a survivor of sexual misconduct on campus, how comfortable would you feel going to a school counselor,” Sciocchetti noted that the wording could be confusing and could lead to inaccurate conclusions. “Does that [question] reflect that students might feel uncomfortable disclosing information to someone they will later interact with on campus? Are they reluctant to come forward because of something they believe the Academy is doing wrong or for other reasons having nothing to do with the Academy’s response?”
As a result, she disagreed with the notion that students on campus are uncomfortable with the counseling services on campus. “I don’t think it means students are dissatisfied with the counseling services on campus, though the question could be misinterpreted to mean that,” she said.
Sciocchetti added that the findings of The Exonian’s survey were not reflective of her own experiences at the Academy thus far. “I can say with confidence that my experience in handling any matters of potential sexual misconduct since early September does not comport with the numbers reflected below.” Nevertheless, she emphasized that she did not want to dismiss any of the sentiments expressed in the survey. Rather, she wanted to clarify the challenges imposed on interpreting the survey results due to the terminology used in the questionnaire.
“I do not wish to convey that I am in any way dismissive of student concerns as may be reflected in the survey results, just that limitations of the terms used in the survey make interpretation of the data challenging,” she said.