At Columbia, Tension Rises Over Sexual Assault

Is Columbia University, one of the nation's premier institutes of higher education, a safe place for the 30,000 students who are beginning a new school year this week? The answer to that question will help determine whether the federal government launches an investigation into the school's handling of sexual assault allegations in recent years.

Currently, 76 colleges are under investigation, including Harvard, Dartmouth, Berkeley and Ohio State. In the spring, 23 Columbia and Barnard students filed a federal complaint with the Department of Education.

Emma Sulkowicz is one of them.

Sulkowicz, a senior art student, said she was raped by a fellow student in her dorm room during her sophomore year. She wasn't alone: two other women claim they were also raped by Sulkowicz's alleged assailant. The university investigated the allegations and held three hearings, but ended up clearing the man. Sulkowicz was denied an appeal. 

"I still go to school with this man," said Sulkowicz. She said he'd once appeared next to her when she was working alone in a photography dark room.

So on Tuesday, the first day of classes, Sulkowicz began an effort that is part-performance art, part-protest, by carrying a mattress wherever she traveled on campus. She plans to keep lugging the mattress around until the university decides to expel the student she said assaulted her. 

The mattress, she said, is symbolic, because it represents a space where she has experienced many cherished moments — late-night conversations with friends, time spent with her boyfriend — along with a very bad one, the rape itself. By carrying the mattress in public, she said she's demonstrating the grueling and highly visible act of bringing rape allegations forward.

Sulkowicz's mission has drawn international attention to sexual violence on college campuses, particularly at Columbia. 

Anti-violence activists say the school's national profile is an asset, because it helps generate media coverage. That coverage, in turn, encourages sexual assault victims to come forward. The number of reported cases of forcible rape on campus rose from three in 2011 to 12 in 2012, but Dana Bolger, co-founder of the sexual anti-violence group Know Your IX, said the increase counter-intuitively may "often signal a good thing," because survivors "feel more confident in their school's processes."

Suzanne Goldberg, a law professor who advises the university on the issue, said the administration had worked to "shift the climate more generally toward greater prevention" of violence. She cited increased staffing at a 24-hour rape crisis center and other resources for students. 

However, critics of the university said the administration had not been transparent enough in its dealings with student activists. Zoe Ridolfi-Starr, a lead complainant, said administrators "continued to ignore us, evade us, stall our efforts" until the national media picked up on the story, and that many anti-violence policies continue to be made without student input. 

But the debate has also prompted serious discussions between new students, men and women, about sexual violence, consent and what role alcohol plays, if any.

In an interview, Mark Flynn, a first-year student at Columbia, said women should take responsibility and limit their intake of alcohol. "Then you won't have to worry about being incapacitated," he said, as his fellow first-year Bianca Brooks listened.

Brooks disagreed, saying she'd recently received an email alert, describing an episode in which a man followed a student into an elevator on campus and touched her inappropriately.

"So it's not always an issue of drinking," she said, "and I think if you always put in a context of 'Sexual assault happens when people drink,' then not only do you demonize alcohol, but you don't recognize the issue for what it is."

For Emma Sulkowicz, the specter of carrying her mattress around campus for months to come is daunting. Her friends, she said, are supportive and tell her she's courageous for publicizing a painful episode of her life.

"But also, it's sort of desperate," she said. "I mean, I'm on my last legs, in terms of hope."