In the media

Lecturers in universities and colleges as well as teachers in public and private schools who are found guilty of abusing students risk having their degrees and diplomas cancelled by the Government to curb rampant abuse, especially of female learners. The Deputy Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education, Science and Technology Development said there was an urgent need to curb the surge in sexual abuse of learners in schools, colleges and universities. Punishments such as imprisonment or expulsion from work was not enough since perpetrators always ended up teaching elsewhere using their diplomas or degrees.

Protesting students at the public Abdelmalek Essaâdi University have called for an investigation into allegations against a professor of mathematics accused of promising female students high marks in exchange for sexual relations, in a case that has rocked the institution and reignited concerns about sexual harassment in Moroccan universities. The sexual harassment allegations came to light after a student created a Facebook page on which she published private conversations and photos. By setting up the Facebook page, the student was acting in compliance with a call by another Arabic Facebook page called Denounce your Harasser, which aims to maximise individual and collective efforts to fight sexual harassment.

Lecherous lecturers who demand sex in return for good marks could be named and shamed if students attending the HEAids National Youth Conference Durban conference. The UN representative said that power relations at campuses proved to be a “very big issue”, particularly the role of lecturers and sex for marks. The students attending one of the sessions came up with an “interesting concept” - to identify the offending lecturers on an application “grey list” so that their names would be known.

Sexual harassment in universities is to be investigated by the National Union of Students, which is conducting the UK’s first survey of staff sexual misconduct in higher education. Students will be asked whether they have experienced or witnessed sexual misconduct by staff and about their experience of reporting this behaviour to their institution. The research project is being carried out by the NUS women’s campaign. Researchers will consider professional boundaries and examine what types of behaviour students are comfortable dealing with from higher education staff.

When a third-year bachelor of arts student at the University of Nairobi, was unable to write her final examination due to illness, her lecturer agreed to let her retake the exam and told her to meet him in his office in the evening to discuss the details. Instead of receiving the information she needed, he informed her that there was no need for her to take the examination and forced her to have sex with him. A 2016 study on sexual harassment among university students at Kenya’s University of Eldoret found that more than 50% of students had encountered sexual harassment and there were no policies to address the issue.

An awareness campaign against widespread corruption in universities, which includes bribery by students to get good results, false diplomas and sex to gain promotion, has been launched by CONAC, the national anti-corruption commission. According to a source “The main kind of corruption here is the sale of grades by certain teachers. Students whose work is bad get teachers or education officials to improve their grades”. CONAC found instances of nepotism, counterfeiting of results, false diplomas, promotions in return for sex, and abuse of power.

A new report by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has revealed how most allegations of corruption in federal universities have neither been thoroughly investigated nor punished. The report titled: ‘Stealing the future: How federal universities in Nigeria have been stripped apart by corruption’ said: “Impunity for corruption in the university system has negatively affected the governance of federal universities and the quality of education received by the students.”

South Korea’s education ministry and Seoul police have begun an investigation into a college in the capital last week following a petition by dozens of students revealing sexual misconduct against female students and violence against male students. It is the first investigation by the education ministry’s Sexual Abuse Task Force, which was launched in February.
According to the executive director of a nationwide union for postgraduate students "Professors wield too much authority over their students. It is difficult to change or confront the student's supervising professor as they have influence over the student's thesis and their eligibility for scholarships as well as assistant jobs."

Sexual misconduct by university staff is rife on campuses, with more than four in 10 students reporting that they have suffered unwelcome advances and assault, including sexualised comments, inappropriate touching and rape, research shows. The study, raises particular concern over the finding that the vast majority of perpetrators are academic staff, who have “power over students’ academic success, well-being and career” prospects. More than 60% of respondents said the perpetrator was a man.

A recent report by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has unearthed the rot in many of Nigeria’s higher institutions, highlighting an intricate collusion among staff, students and other stakeholders. In the report titled, ‘Stealing the future: How federal universities in Nigeria have been stripped apart by corruption’, SERAP claimed that many allegations of corruption in federal universities – such as unfair allocation of grades; contract inflation; truncation of staff’s salary on the payroll; employment of unqualified staff; examination malpractice; sexual harassment; and issuance of results for expelled student to graduate have not been thoroughly investigated.