Last March, Genevieve Mage saw a 2003 yearbook photo of her colleague Matthew Bissell inappropriately hugging a 17-year-old student. She couldn’t let it go.
Shortly before the suit was filed, a district Title IX investigation found that former chemistry teacher and football coach Matthew Bissell engaged in a years-long pattern of inappropriate behavior.
Board members acknowledged, “The buck stops here.”
Superintendent Brent Stephens said the students have identified real structural issues with how the district handles sexual assault reports.
Students shared candid, emotional and angry accounts of trauma, as well as pleas for students and administrators to take these issues more seriously.
Campus culture and safety issues have bubbled to the surface at Berkeley High School this week, with students publicly accusing their classmates of sexual assault and their administration of failing to prevent it.
The California Department of Education said BUSD underplayed the extent to which a student was being harassed, misclassifying the taunts she received as bullying rather than sexual harassment.
All week, students are putting on events to protest the Supreme Court nominee and express support for his accusers.
Roy Charles Waller, 58, was arrested as he arrived at work in Berkeley on Thursday.
Berkeleyside is joining dozens of other media organizations in an initiative to thoroughly track and analyze hate crime and harassment data.
Events range from screenings of ‘Hidden Figures’ and vagina-shaped cookie decorating to a rally in the park after school on Thursday.
The dismissal ties up the latest case in a string of sexual misconduct controversies involving Cal faculty in recent years.
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