Dear Members of the University of Rochester Board of Trustees:

We, signed below, are University of Rochester Alumni who are writing in support of the formal complaint to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission submitted by Dr. Richard Aslin and Dr. Elissa Newport on behalf of Dr. Jessica Cantlon, Dr. Celeste Kidd, Dr. Steven Piantadosi, Dr. Brad Mahon, Dr. Ben Haydon, and Dr. Keturah Bixby. We think it’s clear, as their complaint details that the current system for reporting harassment “is biased and broken.” Like them “we want the university to support – not retaliate against – those who report sexual harassment and other acts that create a hostile environment for students and faculty”

As alumni, we are proud that the University of Rochester has a history of standing with the vulnerable against struggles with the powerful. Unlike many universities across the country that are currently mired in controversy around tearing down monuments and renaming buildings, the University of Rochester has buildings named after people such as Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglas, champions of the oppressed, not the oppressor. We ask: what would Susan B. Anthony think of how these students were treated by a professor, and how the university administration supported the professor, and not the students?

We write as concerned alumni who love the University of Rochester and what it stands for: “Meliora” or “always better.” We feel the treatment of this case goes directly against this ethos, as quoted from the university’s website “Meliora is not just our University’s motto, it’s an ethic that we share as a community, a way of life that unites us in a common bond and a powerful description of who we are and what we value.” How does the university’s treatment of this case fulfil this ethic? We want these processes to be corrected and for the university to take responsibility for how its mishandled this case, to get back on track of “always better.”

Below are our names, the year we graduated, and with which kind of diploma.