Outspoken conservatism puts a target on your back; hold any other views, and you are free to skirt accepted norms and University regulations as you please. That is what I discovered through a dive into a case of sexual assault and academic fraud by a Princeton employee in the early 2000s. In 2006, Princeton failed to investigate a sexual harassment allegation against one of its librarians, referred to in this story by the first-name pseudonym Ava. The very same librarian was discovered to have faked three degrees but inexplicably walked away scot-free until internal pressure finally forced the University to quietly ask for her resignation in 2008. In 2022, a plagiarism allegation against Princeton professor Kevin Kruse has similarly been swept under the rug.
These two cases paint a picture of a University incapable of administering justice. But administer justice they can – so long as you are deemed an ideological enemy. Consider the case of former Princeton Classics professor Joshua Katz. As opposed to Kruse, who has been an outspoken critic of right-wing politicians and commentators – look no further than his Twitter account – and Ava, who also displayed no conservative leanings, Katz spoke out against a faculty letter calling for special privileges for minority professors, a sentiment most popular with the Left. While the University has said virtually nothing about the Kruse allegations and swept Ava’s faked degrees and sexual harassment under the rug, when it came to Katz, President Eisgruber publicly “objected” to his article.
More than that, the University maligned him during Freshman Orientation as a pariah to be held in contempt – all before he was ultimately stripped of his tenure and fired last May. Some have argued that Katz’s termination had nothing to do with his politics. But as the Wall Street Journal deftly put it, if you buy that line, then “you have been living in a cave off-campus.”
There is one distinction between these three individuals: only one of them displayed outspoken conservative views. All signs point to an institution clouded in its administration of justice. On September 6, Princetonians entered the University’s wrought-iron gates to resume their educational journeys. Students shuffled into lecture halls and seminar rooms, books in hand, ready to immerse themselves in the rarified world of internationally-renowned scholars. Sixty seven of them entered McCosh Hall for “The United States, 1920-1974” with Professor Kevin Kruse, who has been embroiled in controversy for alleged plagiarism in his doctoral dissertation and subsequent book, One Nation Under God.
The allegations of plagiarism were first brought to Princeton’s attention by economic historian Phillip Magness; the university responded with six months of silence, followed by a vague assurance that it would look into the matter. Come Fall 2022 and the University has revealed nothing about the outcome of that review as the broader campus community awaits transparency that will likely never surface. Princeton students are constantly reminded of Princeton’s Honor Code and told that if they fail to live up to the standards of “meticulous citation” and violate “the ethic of intellectual honesty,” there will be serious consequences. The juxtaposition is stark; if this is how the administration chooses to deal with its faculty, they have no legitimacy to hold students to a far stricter standard.
Kruse’s case is not the first time that academic misconduct has gone unpunished in Princeton’s history. In July, former Princeton librarian, Paul Needham published an article in Tablet Magazine detailing how a Princeton librarian, Ava, was discovered to have faked a B.A. and M.A. from Oberlin College and an M.M. from the University of Iowa. My own investigation has revealed even further ethical lapses on the part of the University.
Needham, along with several of his fellow librarians pressed the fraud issue at meetings and frequent correspondences with the Administration. Despite this, Ava remained at her job long after her case was taken up for review by Dean of the Faculty, David Dobkin. A source close to the story reported that Dobkin delegated quite a bit to associate dean, Lin Ferrand, a close friend of Ava. Why uphold honesty and moral practices when you can befriend University higher-ups?
It was also well known in the Library that Ava stood high in the University librarian, Karin Trainer’s, favor. In July 2006, Trainer promoted Ava to the position of Interim Librarian of Art and Archeology, a position for which she had no seeming qualifications. To quell concerns over her readiness, Ava wrote to a handful of library colleagues, assuring them that she had a Master’s in Art History from Oberlin and Trainer also sent a message to faculty detailing the subject of the librarian’s fabricated M.A. thesis topic. Favoritism backed by falsity.
In his piece, Needham noted that Ava was also alleged to have committed sexual assault against another library employee, referred to as Bob in this article for privacy concerns. But my investigation discovered that the case goes much deeper than that. According to two independent sources who worked with her, Ava suffered from alcohol abuse – drinking copious amounts at work – and without consent, attempted to force herself on Bob, an assistant in the department, and a married man many years her junior. Bob declined to be interviewed for this piece, but a library employee whom he confided in at the time of the assault shared details of the harassment allegations and their aftermath.
In December 2006, Bob reported the harassment incidents to Trainer, who – as discussed above – had a close relationship with Ava. He was moved to another department, but Ava remained employed and unpunished; she wasn’t even sent to rehabilitation for her substance disorder.
Only in June 2008, after Needham and his band of fellow librarians continuously pressed then provost – and current University President – Christopher Eisgruber on the academic fraud, did the librarian quietly resign, her colleagues and the general community unaware of her professional and personal misdeeds. Not long after that, she found employment at another prestigious library. Counterfeit academic credentials and egregious sexual misconduct were rewarded with a fresh start. She later went on to become Director of that library, clearly not hindered by her misdeeds.
Not until some 16 months after Bob’s report of sexual harassment that he received a call from Human Resources asking him if the problem had been resolved. Bob replied that they had never investigated the problem at all, so there could not have been a resolution. After the phone call, he received no further assistance or information from HR. That brief call – which led to no actionable consequences – was all he got by way of ‘resolution’ to his sexual harassment complaint.
Princeton prides itself on protecting its students and faculty, boasting that it does not “tolerate sexual misconduct, including sexual harassment, sexual assault, stalking, and dating violence.” It promises that upon a formal complaint, “the University Sexual Misconduct/Title IX Coordinator will respond to any immediate health or safety concerns raised…within ten (10) business days of receipt of the formal complaint.” Ten days and at minimum, preliminary findings, not 16 months and a dead-end phone call.
The stark juxtaposition between what the University preaches and what it practices should leave students, faculty, and anyone considering joining the Campus community, skeptical; skeptical of the veracity of any of its statements; skeptical of its promises to protect the people that spend their professional and academic lives on its campus every day; skeptical of its words being anything more than mere decorations adorning publicity campaigns and fund-raising events.
I outline three cases, yet only one was investigated and punished: that of an outspoken conservative. As a Princetonian, I urge the institution to which I have bound myself for the next three years to reflect on these egregious inconsistencies and dispense justice blindly, fairly, and agnostic to political affiliation.
The above is an opinion contribution and reflects the author’s views alone.
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