A female professor at Columbia University filed a lawsuit against the school Tuesday, claiming sexual harassment by a fellow professor.
Enrichetta Ravina, an assistant professor of finance and economics, is suing for $20 million based on allegations that her male colleague at Columbia Business School, Geert Bekaert, sexual harassed her for several years and the school did nothing to address the behavior after she repeatedly brought it to their attention.
The New York Times reports that Ravina was at a critical point in her academic research when the harassment, which included comments about Ravina’s appearance and watching pornography, began.
Bekaert denied the allegations to the Times, saying that they were “baseless” and that Ravina “fabricated a series of completely false allegations.”
“I think my story is awful, but my sense is that many women go through this,” Ravina told the Times. “The school has failed me, and it might have failed other people as well.”
This is the latest in sexual harassment cases involving faculty and staff at universities across the country, including one at UC Berkeley last week.