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The Behrend Beacon
Staffer says U. of Miami
Career Center was ‘Porno
IV files harassment lawsuit
by Karla Schuster
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
For the second time in two
months, the University of Miami
is facing charges it mishandled
sexual harassment complaints
from female employees.
Mariselly Chiroldes, a recruiter
at UM's Toppel Career Center,
says for two years, the school ig
nored complaints that director
Michael Gage spent his workdays
surfing Internet pom sites on of
fice computers and often touched
employees inappropriately, ac
cording to a lawsuit filed last
week in Miami-Dade Circuit
Court.
The university only launched
an investigation, Chiroldes says,
after she filed a complaint with
the U.S. Equal Employment and
Opportunity Commission last
July.
University officials would not
comment on the allegations or the
lawsuit, except to say that Gage,
director of the career center, was
fired late last year.
“The person in question (Gage)
is no longer with the university,”
said UM spokeswoman Margot
Winick. “He was terminated last
year.”
But Chiroldes contends UM
should have acted sooner, noting
that she and two other center em
ployees filed internal grievances
about Gage long before they
lodged complaints with the
EEOC, according to the suit.
“It was like working at Porno
U,” Chiroldes said in a prepared
statement faxed by her attorney,
Spencer Eig of Miami. “I was
Large 14-inch
pizza & two
traumatized by the Internet and
real-life pornography that sur
rounded me working at UM.”
Once, sometime in 2000, ac
cording to the suit, UM suspended
Gage after he was found naked in
his office but eventually allowed
him to return to his supervisory
post at the career center.
“She filed grievances, and the
university didn’t act,” Eig said.
Chiroldes has been working at
the career center, which helps stu
dents and alumni polish their job
hunting skills, since August 1999,
including a five-month maternity
leave.
The two other employees who
filed internal grievances about
Gage - and also lodged complaints
with the EEOC - are filing a law
suit against the university, accord
ing to their attorney, Jack Hickey
of Miami.
The two other women quit the
center because of the conditions
there, Hickey said.
“They made complaints, and the
university did not pursue any ef
fective investigation,” Hickey said.
Chiroldes’ lawsuit is the second
time in recent months the school
has been accused of ignoring alle
gations of sexual harassment by
university employees.
In December, a former assistant
football equipment manager, 19-
year-old Nicole Pytel of Weston,
sued UM for sexual harassment
and discrimination, saying the
school fired her less than an hour
after she filed a complaint with the
federal EEOC charging that the
male equipment managers sexu
ally harassed her.
Behrend College Special!
bottles of
NATIONAL
CAMPUS NEWS
Friday, March 29, 2002
1960 s black activists
return to Stanford
by Kim Vo
Knight Ridder Newspapers
The struggle was clearer in the
19605. Black representation was
low, and equal treatment was rarely
given, so it had to be demanded.
But while the passing decades have
been marked with progress, today’s
students must not become compla
cent, a group of Stanford Univer
sity alumni said Wednesday.
The alumni, many who were
members of the fledging Black Stu
dent Union, participated in a piv
otal event on April 8, 1968. Four
days after Martin Luther King, Jr.
was assassinated, the university
held a campus-wide meeting on
race relations. About 70 black stu
dents rose, took the microphone
from then Provost Richard Lyman
and issued 10 demands to improve
education for black students.
On Wednesday, the alumni revis-
ited Stanford and spoke to students
at lunchtime. They also joined past
administrators and community ac
tivists on an evening panel at
Cubberley Auditorium. It was part
of a two-week celebration of King’s
life; this year’s events highlighted
the contributions “just plain folks”
made to the civil rights movement.
“We knew we were participating
in something important in the
‘6os,” Keni Washington, co-chair
of the BSU in 1968, told students
Wednesday.
Among other things, the 1968
protest led to the formation of
Stanford's first ethnic studies pro
gram, African and African-Ameri
can Studies, and laid the founda
tion for the university's black
themed dorm and cultural pro-
grams
But, today, specific objectives former BSU leaders shake their
seem more elusive, and that is frus- heads. There is so much work left
trating, said students who attended to do, they said, on- and off-cam
the noon luncheon. They asked for pus.
advice on how to be modem activ
ists, especially when many students
on campus don’t feel a sense of ur
gency to demand change - one stu
dent called Stanford “kind of cushy”
- and don’t agree on the pressing
Warren Hayman, a former gradu
ate student, said students must
take advantage of their Stanford
education and connections to
agitate for change later.
Or, as sophomore Nadiya
Figueroa put it, when there is “not
a mike to take.”
Figueroa, a double major in an
thropology and history, said con
cerns range from the number of
black faculty to how mostly minor
ity staff workers are treated to how
people of color are represented in
the humanities curriculum.
This year’s freshmen class has
166 black students, and blacks
make up 9 percent of Stanford’s un
dergraduate class. Black faculty
grew from 27 to 47 in the 19905,
but make up only 3 percent of the
faculty. Blacks are 12 percent of the
national population.
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The lack of urgency made the
Environmental policy and inter
national relations will affect this
generation, said the alumni, many
now in their 50s with salt-and-pep
per beards. Drug addiction and
HIV will have a strong impact on
the black community directly, said
alumna Delores Mack, who is di
rector of the counseling center at
Claremont Colleges. Mack warned
that one day there may be two Afri
can-American communities: one
that is HIV-negative and one that
tests positive.
Warren Hayman, a former gradu
ate student and now assistant dean
at Morgan State University in Bal
timore, said students must take ad
vantage of their Stanford education
and connections to agitate for
change later.
Hayman told the students that
they were T.G.I.F: talented, gifted,
intelligent, and given the times
theyre growing up in, fortunate.
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Guy Reschenthaler, Wire Service Editor
Things
to know
if you’re
feeling
lost
Knight Ridder Newspapers
Things to remember if
you’re 20-something and
feeling lost:
-Realize that you aren’t
the first person to not
know what you want to do,
or to make a mistake at a
young age.
-Don’t feel inferior if
you can’t get a job in the%
exact career you planned
for in college, or if you get
laid off because of the
economy. Career ups and
downs are part of the “real
world.”
-In today’s uncertain
economy, focus on what is
good about the job you
have, and be thankful for
it. Even if a job just helps
you pay the bills and do
things you like, that’s a
plus.
-Don’t try to use your ca
reer, your financial status
or relationship status to de>>
fine yourself* Think about
who you really are, what
makes you happy and what
makes you special.