Since last year, the faculty has been dealing with allegations of sexual harassment of female students by two teachers. Photo credit: KK / BD.
Brno, May 22 (CTK) – A third Czech lecturer has been forced to leave the Faculty of Education at Brno’s Masaryk University (MUNI) in relation to a case of sexual harassment of female students, the university announced in a press release yesterday.
The school withdrew the lecturer from teaching at the beginning of February, when it began investigating the complaint. The employment ended by mutual agreement.
“This is a teacher to whom the publicised cases did not primarily relate, but whose conduct was brought to our attention virtually immediately,” said Simona Korycankova, Dean of the MUNI Faculty of Education. “The lecturer was not teaching and was not in contact with students from the time the complaint was reported until it was resolved.”
“I would like to thank everyone who has contacted us for their trust,” she added. “We take every complaint seriously and I would like to apologise once again to everyone who was affected by the inappropriate behaviour.”
Korycankova said that work was continuing on the reorganisation of the department of physical education and health education, which also includes setting up the faculty rules for sports and field courses.
Since last year, the faculty has been dealing with allegations of sexual harassment of female students by two teachers.
Last May, six female students wrote a complaint against the conduct of two teachers from the department of physical education and health education. They described sexual harassment and unethical behavior during instruction and training courses from 2013 to 2022. This January, in response to questions from reporters, the school confirmed that it had withdrawn these teachers from teaching. Their employment was later terminated and a third teacher was withdrawn from instruction.
Following the affair, MUNI reopened the selection process for a school ombudsman, with Eva Janovicova taking up the post. The university’s management commissioned her to set up a review committee of university experts to assess the methodology and procedures currently in place, based on past experience as well as independent external expertise.
Masaryk University had to address previous incidents of sexual harassment last year, when an associate professor of political science was immediately sacked for sexually harassing a female student after a party. The man did not deny the intimate encounter, but claimed it was consensual.
MUNI Rector Martin Bares said at the time that the school would not tolerate cases of sexual harassment.
