San Jose State’s Academic Senate adopted a resolution regarding the sexual misconduct cases involving Scott Shaw, former director of sports medicine, and the athletic department’s alleged retaliation against whistleblowers.
The “Sense of the Senate Resolution: Expressing Concern About the Athletics Administration at SJSU” passed 40-0 with two abstentions during the senate’s Monday Zoom meeting.
The five-paragraph resolution expressed concern about SJSU’s “culture of retaliation, harassment, and bullying,” within SJSU Athletics and underneath director Marie Tuite, according to a Monday Mercury News article.
Shaw was director of sports medicine from 2008 until his August 2020 resignation. SJSU first investigated sexual misconduct claims against Shaw in 2009 and concluded its investigation in 2010 after finding no evidence of wrongdoing, according to an April 17, 2020 USA Today article.
The investigation was reopened in December 2019 after swimming and diving head coach Sage Hopkins sent a 300-page dossier to university officials detailing 17 swimming and diving athletes’ accounts of Shaw touching them inappropriately during physical therapy.
The university apologized for its wrongdoing in handling the cases for the first time in an April 15 campuswide email, where President Mary Papazian said the external investigators confirmed the recent and previous misconduct cases as substantiated.
Papazian asked the Senate to refrain from voting on the resolution until an investigation into the allegations of retaliation by an external party was complete, the same Mercury News article reported.
The resolution was co-written by three SJSU faculty members: political science professor Karthika Sasikumar, Chicana and Chicano studies professor Julia Curry and biology professor Brandon White.
Sasikumar said the resolution wasn’t an attempt to prejudge Shaw or the athletics department but to “give a voice to concerns that we [the faculty] have heard from our constituents.”
Senators said during the meeting that the resolution will be sent to various bodies in the California State University (CSU) system, including the Board of Trustees, CSU Chancellor Joseph Castro and all 23 CSU presidents.
Dalila Gomez, associated students director of student rights and responsibilities, said if senators rejected the resolution, the university would be considered complicit with Shaw’s behavior.
“The retaliation, bullying and attacks on many individuals within the athletics department is inexcusable,” Gomez said during the meeting. “This long-standing cover-up of reported sexual abuse of dozens of women on our campus is horrific and if this resolution does not pass, we’ll be considered complicit.”
Hopkins filed a lawsuit in March to the Santa Clara County Superior Court against SJSU and CSU officials, including Tuite, claiming retaliation against him after ignoring his claims against Shaw for years, according to the 93-page court documents obtained by the Spartan Daily.
Gomez said the athletics department “no longer shows up” for athletes because it’s unwilling to address its mishandlings and ill-treatment of athletes.
Political science professor Kenneth Peter said although he supports the resolution, he doesn’t consider termination or resignation of university officials to be necessary steps at the moment.
“There could be a time in the future where those kinds of steps might be warranted but this is not yet that time and this is not yet that resolution,” Peter said during the meeting.
Papazian stated in the April 15 campuswide email that as the investigation continues, the university will add more resources to its Title IX office and create more education and orientation programs focused on sexual assault prevention.
Kenneth Mashinchi, senior director of media relations, said in an April 25 email that for a “better understanding of the situation,” the university has created a frequently asked questions page that details the 2019 external investigation.
Nikos Moutros, the president of SJSU’s California Faculty Association (CFA) chapter, said the chapter sent a letter to Castro calling for Tuite’s suspension.
The CFA is a statewide CSU faculty and staff union.
“Under no circumstances the administration should engage in retaliating against people who bring forth these complaints,” Moutros said in an April 29 Zoom interview. “That's not appropriate and that's a violation of state law.”
