Dive Brief:
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Baylor University President and Chancellor Ken Starr was demoted to chancellor and head football coach Art Biles was fired over the gross mishandling of numerous sexual assault investigations involving members of the football team, as detailed in a report from the school's regents.
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Some are celebrating the firing of Biles as a shift in the football-as-king attitude that pervades across top-tier Division I institutions in the country, but others are wondering why Starr is retaining any position in administration at the private Texas university.
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The case has been another link in the fence that is higher ed’s failure around sexual assault and issues of gender equality.
Dive Insight:
Since 2000, the Baylor athletics department has seen its share of scandal — from illegal tuition payments for members of the basketball team and the murder of another basketball player by one of the beneficiaries and a conspiracy to cover it all up to an extortion attempt by another basketball coach who threatened to deport one of his star recruits if he didn’t sign with Baylor to the latest evidence of a history of ignored sexual assault cases involving football players.
Baylor should serve as a worst-case-scenario example of one major shortcoming of the NCAA athletics machine. With high stakes around revenue tied to the success of a program, many institutions are often inclined to look the other way on infractions involving top student-athletes.
But sexual assault is not just a problem among student-athletes, and higher ed as a whole must get better at its handling of sexual assault. Many survivors of sexual assault feel colleges do not do enough in their investigation and discipline of the cases, leading to an increasing number of lawsuits around the country — and judges are agreeing with their assertions of institutional negligence. Reauthorization of the Higher Education Act is expected to come with an increased conversation around holding schools accountable on the issue.
The irony of this massive failure falling on the shoulders of the man who was once chief invesitgator in the case of former President Bill Clinton's sexual misconduct is not lost on many.