Gray area between students and teachers

Sexual harassment is a serious threat in colleges, but the way to tackle it is to set up a mechanism by which victims and authorities can stop it, not poison positive interactions.

On Oct 14, Xiamen University announced the result of an investigation into a sexual harassment case: Professor Wu Chunming had "unethical sex" with one of his female students on numerous occasions and had sexually harassed another of his graduate students. The punishment: Wu was stripped of his Communist Party membership and his teaching position.

The university authority had been accused of procrastination and creating a cover-up when the story first surfaced. Wu was a star on the faculty and the only one in his school to confer doctoral degrees in archaeology. Only two of his female PhD candidates came out publicly with accusations, while reportedly 122 of his peers and students issued a public letter in his defense.