Duke may soon have a policy governing consensual relationships between superiors and subordinates if it is approved by the Academic Council at its March meeting.
The Office of Institutional Equity has presented policy drafts to the faculty governing body for the past two months. "It is prompted by the realization this is the kind of policy we've never had," said Peter Burian, Academic Council chair. "We have a nepotism rule, we have a sexual harassment policy, but we don't have anything on consensual relations."
The draft policy's rationale states that having romantic or sexual relationships with subordinates is likely to interfere with the ability of a superior to make decisions fairly. In addressing employee-employee and employee-faculty relationships, the policy guides supervisors to disclose relationships with subordinates and not to have a role in promoting or setting wages for them.
Although the latest version of the policy treats failure to comply as professional misconduct, it does not specify any guidelines for punishment.
Burian said the tension lies in whether to make the policy an ethical statement or a penal code, adding that the council's goal should not be to legislate morality, but to promote fairness.
"We got a considerable reaction to what was seen as ambiguity and came up with something more specific and there was a reaction to that, basically saying this created a policy that looked too penal and judicial," he said. "We are going back to more of a statement of ethical principles and guidelines."
Many professors cautioned that if the policy turned into a more code-like document, it should spell out what the policies are.
Others said it is impossible to think of every situation. "I think the attempt to write in a set of clear and distinct rules, which came out of the first Academic Council meeting, seemed to be a source of more trouble than advantage," said Provost Peter Lange. "This is an area of great ambiguity.... Just think about your dating life. When are you dating someone and when are you just friends?"
Perhaps even trickier are relationships between graduate students and faculty, graduate students and undergraduates or undergraduates and faculty. "[The council's Executive Committee] felt perhaps a special emphasis should be given to the student-faculty relationship because it's particularly delicate," Burian said, adding that the council needs more input on the issue.
Elayne Heisler, president of the Graduate and Professional Student Council, sent out an e-mail to graduate students Wednesday soliciting opinion.
She said she thinks most graduate students know it would be unprofessional to date undergraduates in their sections, but that guidelines would still be helpful.
"You have a situation where young faculty come here and some faculty are younger than the graduate students," Heisler said. "They're not your peers, but in other circumstances they are." She wondered how effective the policy would be without consequences for violating it.
Burian said that if undergraduates were dating their undergraduate TAs, there could be conflicts of interest.
Thomas Nechyba, director of undergraduate studies in economics, said his department is phasing in a plan to take grading out of the hands of undergraduate TAs, in part due to conflicts of interest.
"There are many other [conflicts] that aren't addressed, such as pledge brothers and friends. Romantic relationships are one, but others could arise," he said.
Sally Dickson, vice president for institutional equity, said the Academic Council discussed a similar policy nearly three years ago but never settled on a final version. She said most universities have such a policy and that no incidents in particular have spurred the policy at Duke.
The issue has become a hot one in higher education, after a professor at the College of William & Mary published an account in GQ about the affairs he had with students. Since then, the college has passed a policy banning all relationships between undergraduates and faculty.
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