Bahk Eun-ji has been with The Korea Times since 2012, building a career across multiple desks. She began at the Business Desk, where she conducted in-depth interviews with key figures in Korea's corporate world. Later, she moved to the Politics & City Desk, focusing on education policy and social affairs. She later served as team leader of the digital content team, leading curation efforts on the newspaper’s homepage and reshaping print stories for social media audiences to enhance digital reach. Now back on the Politics Desk, she covers the National Assembly and the Ministry of National Defense, with a renewed focus on political developments.
Professors are main perpetrators of sexual abuse at graduate schools: survey
By Bahk Eun-ji
More than six out of every 10 cases of sexual violence against graduate school students are committed by their professors, a survey showed, Tuesday.
According to the survey of 83 male and 230 female graduate school students at Kyung Hee University conducted by the school's student counselling center from December to January, 24.3 percent, or 76 respondents, said they experienced sexual harassment or assault during their coursework.
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By Bahk Eun-ji
Among the respondents who experienced sexual harassment or assault, 65.5 percent, or 36, said the perpetrators were their professors, while 21.8 percent, or 12, pointed to senior or junior students.
Thirty-one, or 40.8 percent of such cases, involved sexually-harassing remarks made during classes, while in 26 cases, the students reported finding themselves in forced drinking situations with, or being pressed to pour drinks, for the perpetrators.
All respondents said they felt insulted or ashamed after experiencing sexual harassment. But most of them did not make official reports over fears of retaliation or no positive outcome.
The university sent the survey result to faculty members and professors and said it is difficult for graduate students to sound an alarm when they experience sexual harassment from professors, because the teachers are closely tied in with their studies and career paths after graduation.
The survey was conducted after a professor at the school raped a graduate student in March last year. The professor was later arrested.