The way the Duke Administration worked to throw their lacrosse players under the bus well after anyone with any sense knew the real story told me everything I needed to know about ethics at Duke. I’m surprised this guy lasted as long as he did.
The Group of 88 is the term for the professors at Duke University who were signatories to a controversial advertisement in The Chronicle, the university’s student newspaper, on April 6, 2006. The advertisement addressed the Duke lacrosse case, in which an African-American woman claimed to have been raped by three white members of Duke’s lacrosse team several weeks earlier. The incident was under police investigation at the time of the advertisement, and all charges were dropped and the students declared innocent by the North Carolina Attorney General less than a week after its publication.
The Group of 88 is the term for the professors at Duke University who were signatories to a controversial advertisement in The Chronicle, the university’s student newspaper, on April 6, 2006. The advertisement addressed the Duke lacrosse case, in which an African-American woman claimed to have been raped by three white members of Duke’s lacrosse team several weeks earlier. The incident was under police investigation at the time of the advertisement, and all charges were dropped and the students declared innocent by the North Carolina Attorney General less than a week after its publication.
One signer, Kim Curtis, a visiting associate professor in the Political Science department who specializes in political and feminist theory, failed two members of the lacrosse team who were in one of her classes. When one of them appealed the grade, Duke did not act immediately; they eventually raised his grade from “F” to “D”. Kyle Dowd and his parents sued Curtis and the university. Duke later settled, listing the grade as “Pass”.[6][7][8]
An engineering professor at Duke, Michael Gustafson, was concerned that the restrictions on stereotyping had been done away with. He suggested that the accused lacrosse players had not been evaluated as individuals, but as caricatures, making it easier for commentators to criticize them.[9]
One of the signers, English professor Cathy Davidson, wrote in the Raleigh News & Observer in January 2007 that the ad was a response “to the anguish of students who felt demeaned by racist and sexist remarks swirling around in the media and on the campus quad in the aftermath of what happened on March 13 in the lacrosse house.”[10]
Ten months after the original letter to The Chronicle, a group of 17 economics faculty signed an alternative petition, stating “the Group of 88 does not speak for all Duke faculty”.
This.I’m surprised this guy lasted as long as he did.