Student-Professor Sexual Relationships

[ergative]

I feel like all this discussion over whether there is genuine love or not is beside the point. Patients can genuinely fall in love with their doctors. Military personnel can genuinely fall in love with their commanding officers. Hell, prisoners can (I imagine) genuinely fall in love with their correctional officers. But in those cases I think most reasonable people would agree that the preexisting professional and power ties between these people preclude any ethical relationship, until those ties have been changed---the patient switches doctors, the prisoner is released or the CO reassigned, the military people are discharged or transferred so there are no direct chains of command*.

To me, the student-professor relationship falls under this category: no matter how true and genuine the love is, the preexisting power structure makes consumating that relationship ethically suspect. And I don't mean the power structure that comes from direct supervision or teaching. I mean the power structure that comes from a person with a PhD being in a position to make introductions and write letters of recommendation whose value depends on the assumption that the assessment is professional, rather than personal. Waiting for this power structure to evaporate is not unreasonale: students will not be students forever, and they should just keep their f*cking pants on until Stu graduates. As I get older and crotchetier, and as I see more and more stories about people in power ruining other people's lives and careers because they couldn't control themselves, I have less and less patience with the 'TWU WUV' excuse. If the wuv is twu, it can wait until Stu finishes college.


*I know nothing about how military things work, so I'm really basing this sense of appropriate ethical behavior on Star Trek. Please feel free to correct me if there's an accepted procedure in place.

[dr_codex]

I feel like all this discussion over whether there is genuine love or not is beside the point. Patients can genuinely fall in love with their doctors. Military personnel can genuinely fall in love with their commanding officers. Hell, prisoners can (I imagine) genuinely fall in love with their correctional officers. But in those cases I think most reasonable people would agree that the preexisting professional and power ties between these people preclude any ethical relationship, until those ties have been changed---the patient switches doctors, the prisoner is released or the CO reassigned, the military people are discharged or transferred so there are no direct chains of command*.

To me, the student-professor relationship falls under this category: no matter how true and genuine the love is, the preexisting power structure makes consumating that relationship ethically suspect. And I don't mean the power structure that comes from direct supervision or teaching. I mean the power structure that comes from a person with a PhD being in a position to make introductions and write letters of recommendation whose value depends on the assumption that the assessment is professional, rather than personal. Waiting for this power structure to evaporate is not unreasonale: students will not be students forever, and they should just keep their f*cking pants on until Stu graduates. As I get older and crotchetier, and as I see more and more stories about people in power ruining other people's lives and careers because they couldn't control themselves, I have less and less patience with the 'TWU WUV' excuse. If the wuv is twu, it can wait until Stu finishes college.


*I know nothing about how military things work, so I'm really basing this sense of appropriate ethical behavior on Star Trek. Please feel free to correct me if there's an accepted procedure in place.

The military has rules against "fraternization". if you're curious, start here: https://www.armyg1.army.mil/hr/command/docs/dap60035.pdf One thing that you'll note is that the relationships don't have to be sexual to be prohibited. (Gambling is forbidden, for example.) Nor do they necessarily have to be ones of direct supervision, so "waiting it out" might actually mean somebody mustering out.

My institution just issued its formal policy on "consensual relationships". Since I am in one -- trailing spouse -- I read it carefully. We could have a supervisory relationship, like Spork, but would have to have a parallel line of supervision set up. That's happened for parents & children on our campus for analogous reasons.

My sense of the room is that these relations are more common (and problematic) between staff / administrators and students on my campus. Those of you with robust athletics programs might like to take note. But it's also come up in our ROTC unit, at all levels; anti-fraternization rules apply among students, too, if they have ranks.

[Hibush]

People have made lots of cases for a particular place to draw the line. Different people find different answers. That sets the stage for dangerous misunderstandings. Make sure that your institutions policy has no gray areas. Ambiguity in the rules on this issue results in grievances, lawsuits, firings and lingering hard feelings. Check what your policy is, and suggest quick action from the head of the faculty senate if there isn't one.

While much of the discussion has focused on the love life of various individuals, that is not what the institution wants to police. The most important issue from the institution's perspective is equitable treatment of all students. If faculty are having relationships with students, it creates a powerful impression of unfairness in the treatment of students. That situation should be unacceptable just about everyone.

[downer]

While much of the discussion has focused on the love life of various individuals, that is not what the institution wants to police. The most important issue from the institution's perspective is equitable treatment of all students. If faculty are having relationships with students, it creates a powerful impression of unfairness in the treatment of students. That situation should be unacceptable just about everyone.

I'm not sure that's true. It is a concern. There is a question in such relationships of who is using who.

Seems to me that the central concern these days is that faculty are coercing students into relationships. I.e. that "voluntary relationships" are not really voluntary.
Here's an article about the recent surge of policy on faculty-student relationships and the #me-too influence. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/05/24/academe-sees-new-wave-faculty-student-relationship-restrictions-era-me-too

[marshwiggle]

One issue that no-one has mentioned that I've heard of is that someone who gets a PhD and has a romantic relationship with the supervisor can have a hard time getting hired because the degree is suspect. Whether the relationship lasts or not, it's going to be impossible to prove that the student's performance was evaluated completely objectively.

[apl68]

I worked in the same department as a guy who married his former undergraduate student. They were "dating" while she was a student and he was not allowed to assess any of her work but was allowed to have the relationship. Icky and weird. I think they've been married for 25 years now and have a kid. He's been retired for a few years, much to everyone's relief.

I've seen something like this happen.  One of my undergrad profs began quietly dating a student who was about a year older than I during her senior year.  They married a year or two after I graduated, i.e. two or three years after she did.  He was a rather young prof, so the age difference was not all that great.  She went to work for the university in a staff capacity outside his department.  Last I heard they were both still there and still married. 

This was at a church-affiliated school where a lot of eyes would have been on them.  They seem to have taken all due care to avoid any appearance of impropriety.  As far as I know, nobody ever gave them a hard time over it.

[Caracal]

I don't really think you will find many relationships without power imbalances, so if you want to condemn this particular one, you should probably condemn most relationships.

I'm not really interested in condemning relationships. If this is just out in the world, I'm not really called upon to approve of or condemn anything. I'm more concerned about what relationships like that do to the relationships between students and faculty at a school. If a faculty member is viewing students as potential romantic partners, that isn't compatible with appropriate teacher student relationships. I don't think that's true about other sorts of power imbalances. Colleagues dating needs to be approached with some caution, but it isn't inherently damaging to norms in the way that a teacher-student relationship is.

[Kron3007]

People have made lots of cases for a particular place to draw the line. Different people find different answers. That sets the stage for dangerous misunderstandings. Make sure that your institutions policy has no gray areas. Ambiguity in the rules on this issue results in grievances, lawsuits, firings and lingering hard feelings. Check what your policy is, and suggest quick action from the head of the faculty senate if there isn't one.

While much of the discussion has focused on the love life of various individuals, that is not what the institution wants to police. The most important issue from the institution's perspective is equitable treatment of all students. If faculty are having relationships with students, it creates a powerful impression of unfairness in the treatment of students. That situation should be unacceptable just about everyone.

Yes, it seems pretty easy to me.  If there is a conflict of interest, or the potential for a conflict of interest, there should be policies in place to address it.  A professor should not be able to have any influence on the grades of their partner.   

If it is something like an English professor dating an engineering student at the university and there is no potential COI, I dont see an issue since they are both adults without any real professional interaction.

[downer]

If we distinguish between relationships between on the one hand faculty and their current students, or students who they have direct power over, and on the other hand, faculty and students who they have only very indirect authority, we can probably sort out a lot of the problems with abuses of the teacher-student relationship and special treatment (positive or negative) of the student by the faculty member.

I'm less inclined to say that the area of college education is one where people are especially vulnerable compared with other workplaces. I guess some campuses are sheltered and their students are naive, but they are all adults. For most faculty, most students are, to borrow a phrase, just warm bodies. I don't see anything particular special about the pedagogical teacher-student relationship that means we should  apply different standards to it.

[Hibush]

In a new type of inappropriate-relationship situation (with certain parallels), Purdue is considering prohibiting professors from betting on Purdue football. (CHE story)

The problematic scenarios are mostly implied, but they have to do with uneven treatment. For example: If a star player is in a professor's course, that professor could put extra pressure on the student before a game, and then bet against Purdue.

[hamburger]

Isn't passing of the professor's gene the most efficient way to transfer knowledge? The student gets everything from the professor quickly this way without the need to study hard.

[secundem_artem]

I have 2 colleagues that married former students.  Personally, I don't know what a fully grown adult sees in a romantic relationship with somebody in or barely out of their teens, but that's just me and maybe it's different if they are a graduate student.

One other concern would be for the relationship to disintegrate and result in a #metoo moment at which case the faculty member is at risk even more than the student.  Didn't David Mamet write a play more or less to that effect?

The number of careers (both faculty and student) that have gone down the swirler due to an inability to maintain one's zipper in the fully upright and locked position is incalculable.  I work with a lot of cute students, but getting involved with one seems like a really bad idea.  Plus Mrs Artem would not be happy.

[Hibush]

One other concern would be for the relationship to disintegrate and result in a #metoo moment at which case the faculty member is at risk even more than the student.  Didn't David Mamet write a play more or less to that effect?

I saw Oleanna not long after starting a faculty position. It is memorable.

[ergative]

One other concern would be for the relationship to disintegrate and result in a #metoo moment at which case the faculty member is at risk even more than the student.  Didn't David Mamet write a play more or less to that effect?

The #metoo moment occurs when a person of power uses that power to extract sexual favors from someone, with the threat of damage to their career if they refuse. It is not

-A broken relationship
-An accusation of misconduct
-A general feeling of sympathy for the wrongdoer who should have known better than to get involved.

I am sympathetic to people who are wrongly accused of sexual misconduct and have their careers damaged as a result. But those situations are not #metoo moments, and I really wish people would stop lumping them all together. The conflation only does damage to the genuine situations.

[writingprof]

One other concern would be for the relationship to disintegrate and result in a #metoo moment at which case the faculty member is at risk even more than the student.  Didn't David Mamet write a play more or less to that effect?

I saw Oleanna not long after starting a faculty position. It is memorable.

Ah, yes, Oleanna.  A female student lies about rape because she knows that the university's real power structures will favor the accuser.  Her male professor responds by beating the s--t out of her.  Just a lot of helpful lessons for everyone.