By Ellen J. Staurowsky, Ed.D., Professor, Sport Management, Drexel University, ejs95@drexel.edu
The issue of sexual assault on college campuses has received considerable attention in the aftermath of the Department of Education Office for Civil Rights issuing a Dear Colleague letter in 2011 reminding colleges and university officials of their obligations under Title IX in the handling of sexual assault cases. Added impetus to hold institutions accountable came in 2014 when the White House issued an executive order establishing a Task Force to Protect Students From Sexual Assaults.
Since that time, cases similar to the one filed on March 21, 2016 by female rower Daisy Tackett against her previous institution, the University of Kansas (KU), have appeared frequently in the news. Tackett, eschewing privacy concerns and allowing her name to be used in the case and in the media, alleges that she was raped by a football player in October of 2014, the fall of her first year on the KU campus. The incident is said to have occurred in the football player’s room in a KU residence known as the Jayhawker Towers. According to the lawsuit, Tackett had gone to a Halloween party the night of the assault. Tired of the partying and the smoke, she left with the intent of returning to her dorm. The football player approached her, asked if she wished to go watch a television show in his room, and they left together. The shock and horror of the experience initially rendered Tackett silent in the aftermath.
For the 2014-2015 academic year, she attempted to go about her life at school as she had done before. She attended classes, served on student senate, and participated as a member of the KU rowing team. Tackett navigated the campus with the intention of avoiding her assailant, referred to in the lawsuit as John Doe G. Rowing team practices, however, were scheduled at KU’s football stadium. Thus, as the months passed, she started to experience panic attacks.
She returned to KU for the 2015-2016 academic year expecting to resume her roles as a student and member of the rowing team. In the course of her second year on the team, two issues arose simultaneously. First, Tackett alleges that the head coach of the rowing team regularly made racial comments, described some of the women on the team as “fat”, and was not fair in the way that he dealt with the rowers. Meetings between team members and KU athletics staff (a sport psychologist and the senior woman’s administrator) did little to remedy such behavior and established, according to Tackett, a pattern of deliberate indifference. Second, it was during this same period of time that Tackett learned that one of her teammates had been sexually assaulted by John Doe G. in the Jayhawker Towers. Her teammate had taken the step of reporting the assault to the police and to campus authorities.
Her teammate’s disclosure became a catalyst for Tackett to act. After meeting with the rowing team’s trainer, she then went through a series of referrals that resulted in conversations with the KU Athletic Department physician, the senior woman’s administrator, and a representative from KU’s Institutional Opportunity and Access (IOA) office. Tackett alleges that a result of those meetings, once notification of her report reached John Doe G., was his sudden reappearance in her life. When she would come out of meetings or class, he would be waiting for her, calling her derogatory names. KU eventually provided an employee to accompany Tackett from one class to another.
As the weeks and months of fall 2014 passed, Tackett’s growing levels of anxiety affected her during rowing practices, as her panic attacks intensified. Although her coaches were aware of the alleged rape and the stress Tackett was under after reporting the incident, Tackett was informed by coaches that she had been taken off the travel roster despite the fact that she was still able to put in performances that she claims were better than some of her peers.
That equivocation regarding Tackett’s prospects on the team, a message from her coach that if she wished to transfer she would be limited to applying to schools outside of the Big XII along with the strain of the continuing investigation, during which John Doe G. remained on campus, led to Tackett’s decision to withdraw from KU with an initial belief that she would be welcomed back to the team should she wish to return to school there. Within weeks of leaving campus, Tackett received an email from coaches asking for her equipment to be returned and a bill from KU for the semester with a caution that if the bill remained unpaid she would be contacted by a collections agency. She was unable to move forward with plans to transfer because an administrative hold was placed on her transcript.
As in other cases, Tackett argues that KU subjected her to a hostile educational environment because of the severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive harassment she experienced from John Doe G. in a residence hall that Tackett asserts was known to be an unsafe environment for students that had had a long history of previous incidents of the kind that affected her. Tackett asserts that there was intentionality on the part of KU to place football players in the Jayhawker Tower so that they would receive less supervision and with the knowledge that there was a greater likelihood that sexual misconduct would occur. Citing numerous other KU failures, including not properly training staff to respond appropriately to sexual assaults through prevention and education as well as investigation and disciplinary actions, Tackett alleges that KU officials were deliberately indifferent to her and that she suffered retaliation believed to have been directed at Tackett by John Doe G and the KU rowing coach. Tackett seeks actual damages above $75,000 for attorney’s fees and the cost of the lawsuit along with a return of payments she made to the University for tuition and board. She further asks that KU be enjoined to relieve the administrative holds placed on her transcripts and more generally, other legal and equitable relief as appropriate.
As Tackett’s case moves forward, a novel development is also being pursued. Tackett’s parents, in a separate lawsuit wherein they seek class action status on behalf of parents similarly situated, complain that KU officials knowingly misrepresented the Jayhawker Tower as being safe and secure. Enumerating nine other reported sexual assaults on the KU campus between March of 2013 and February of 2016, the Tacketts challenge KU on the accuracy of its assurances regarding the safety and security in housing on campus and the omission of material facts regarding sexual assault on the campus, arguing the University violates the Kansas Consumer Protection Act.
In response, the University stated that “the suggestion that our residence halls are unsafe or that we misrepresent campus safety in our student recruitment is baseless”, further noting that the lawsuit “inaccurately portrays the environment at the University of Kansas and our ongoing efforts to ensure students are safe and aware of their surroundings” (Nestle, 2016).
Should the Tacketts prevail, this case could have far reaching implications across the college and university landscape.
References
Nestle, M. L. (2016, March 14). Parents sue Kansas University over alleged dorm rapes. The Daily Beast. Retrieved from http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/03/14/parents-sue-kansas-university-over-alleged-dorm-rapes.html
Daisy Tackett v. University of Kansas. Case No. 2016 — CV — 00116. Retrieved from http://www.brownandcurry.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/3.21.16-File-Stamped-Petition.pdf
James Tackett & Amanda Tackett v. University of Kansas. Case No. 2016 — CV — 000103. Retrieved from http://www.brownandcurry.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Petition-File-stamped.pdf
