Comment

Anonymous
Confronting university harassment: ‘You’re dumb, but you’re a pretty girl’

Sitting in my mandatory coding workshop, I felt a spray on the back of my neck. As the thick smell of men’s deodorant spread and sank into my clothes, I saw my tutor slip the can back into his bag before sitting down next to me. I stayed quiet, unsure how to react to behaviour that seemed so completely out of place, though not surprising given his previous actions.

This wasn’t my first negative experience at this top-tier Australian university, nor would it be my last. I am now in the third year of a four-year double degree, and in that time the institution has taught me that my worth is conditional, my safety negotiable, and my future dependent upon my acceptance of unacceptable treatment.

Having graduated from high school with strong results, I had expected university to challenge the limits of what I already knew. The toughest challenges I’ve faced have not been academic, and they have taken a far greater emotional toll than I could ever have expected.

From day one of my compulsory coding course, I was treated differently. In a male-dominated cohort, I was often one of few women, or the only woman, in classes of about 60 people. While male classmates received attendance marks upon arrival, my attendance wasn’t recorded until I had completed tasks. My tutor would hover nearby as I worked, sitting uncomfortably close while checking my work and occasionally brushing my hand when reaching for the keyboard.

By late April, his behaviour had become undeniably questionable. While marking my major project, he repeatedly caressed my hand as it rested on my laptop, while giving criticism that focused more on my perceived inadequacies than on constructive feedback. As he marked my assessment with 51 per cent – one percentage point over the required hurdle – his final words ruptured any remaining sense of safety, forcing me to take action: “You’re dumb, but you’re a pretty girl, so I’ll let you pass.”

The department head was supportive when I reported the incident, reassigning me to a different tutor within the same workshop. I had planned to let this experience pass, until the new tutor reviewed my project and said the score was far too low. The discrimination wasn’t just personal; it was academic.

Following the advice of the human resources staff member, I filed a formal report with the university’s integrity unit. In a short follow-up phone call, I was told not of any consequences but that my report would be “kept on file” and, since the perpetrator was a university employee, this would be their last correspondence with me on the matter.

I took my complaint to higher administration, directly contacting the university’s vice-chancellor. As a result, the university appointed a helpful private investigator, who asked me to re-create the interactions in videos. He also requested that I identify potential witnesses from a list of all enrolled students – neither of the students I indicated responded to requests for supporting evidence.

By August of that year, the private investigator informed me that he had finished his report and the outcome was now being “considered by the relevant area manager”. The tutor remained unaware of my complaint.

Following up after a month of silence, I was told “appropriate action had been taken”, but I had no idea what that meant. Even the private investigator admitted he hadn’t been informed of the outcome.

Finally, the university confirmed its conclusion in an email: the tutor’s contract had ended and therefore “the process … no longer applied”. There was no accountability. No disciplinary action. No assurance that he wouldn’t repeat this behaviour elsewhere. I received just one final phone call, reporting that he now attended a different university.

The university provides a little preparatory guidance for students embarking on degrees in my field. The annual, compulsory academic integrity course centred on cheating and plagiarism. In the semester following my incident, however, the university introduced a new course on consent and respectful relationships. Though framed as supportive, it offered only superficial guidance to students in scenarios such as mine – shifting responsibility onto them while distancing the university from any accountability. Since that semester, this course has been removed.

There is other guidance, however. A poster is pinned on the wall of the lab, a list of don’ts that includes “NO PORNOGRAPHY”. As far as I’m aware – and I’ve looked – there is no such signage in computer labs for other disciplines.

National data indicates only 37 per cent of university-enrolled STEM students are women, and just 15 per cent of the STEM workforce is female. Unfortunately, my experience isn’t rare.

Wanting change – not only for myself, but for any women planning to pursue STEM – I conducted an informal investigation. I surveyed as many of the university’s female STEM students as possible, receiving a total of 40 anonymised responses. I collated the data, revealing shocking statistics about sexual harassment, bullying and discrimination at the university.

Seventy per cent of the women I surveyed reported experiencing discrimination from male peers, and half reported discrimination from tutors. Thirty per cent had endured sexual harassment – ranging from invasive comments to inappropriate touching. One woman stopped attending her maths tutorials entirely because she “could not go without uncomfortable staring”.

I compiled the data into a report, suggesting an independent investigation into such misconduct and enforcing training programs for all tutors, and presented it to the vice-chancellor and head of mathematics. I did succeed in securing a meeting with a member of the university’s inclusivity team and the head of mathematics, reigniting some hope for change, but the higher administration showed no motivation.

In January of 2025, long after my meeting, I received an email from the integrity unit that read: “Some time ago you had a conversation with the University about the treatment of women in our STEM programs… The Integrity Unit is now planning to provide some training to new tutors to support them in creating inclusive learning environments … and we would be very grateful for your feedback.”

It was hopeful. I met with two staff, provided my feedback and shared extra data from my investigation and my own experience from first year to inform their teaching. I was told that a program was to be trialled as soon as possible, with the mathematics department being the first to be involved. I was promised an update after trialling in January.

There has been no communication since. I can only assume this program has simply evaporated into the university’s bureaucracy.

My most recent experiences with the mathematics department have again been marked by troubling behaviour. For one subject this year, in which I’d been achieving 90-100 per cent on every assignment and quiz, my latest test mark was just 40 per cent. This drop was followed by an email from my lecturer requesting a private meeting to discuss my results.

The request appeared harmless, yet it left me with a lingering physical discomfort. I convinced myself that my gut instincts were wrong, that previous experiences were clouding future ones and I should give this situation the benefit of the doubt.

I went to that meeting, sitting across from the lecturer in his office as he effectively presented two options: withdraw without fail (a decision I would have to make by the end of the week) or meet with him weekly, privately, in his office, to be shown how to improve.

There was no clear indication of what I was doing wrong. The problem could only be resolved by seeing him. Alone. Regularly. I withdrew two days later with the intention of tackling it in my fourth and final year.

Logic told me this was the best decision. Yet I felt like a complete failure – as if I had given in to a system that wanted to see me fail; an institution celebrating the fact it had taken my money without giving me an education. What felt even more disturbing was that, when I emailed the lecturer to tell him I was withdrawing from the course, he still encouraged me to meet with him in private throughout this semester.

I requested an informal meeting with the same integrity unit staff who had designed the training program. I wanted to discuss how I should approach my future studies given this event, knowing I would have to repeat this course the following year, most likely with this lecturer. The staff were sympathetic, understanding my concerns and agreeing that I was right to consider my safety.

A week later, they contacted me requesting my permission for a staff member to “have a general conversation” with this lecturer, without mentioning my name. They noted also that they believed it was very possible the lecturer “would infer [my identity] in the context”, placing my future studies and safety at risk. I too held this overwhelming fear and immediately responded by asking them to phrase this discussion as a “general policy conversation”, rather than a personal accusation.

To date, I have received no response and am worried this conversation was conducted without consideration for my future safety.

It is easy to believe these experiences are isolated. That the problem lies within one bad tutor or a single untrained lecturer. But as I sit in these experiences, I am surrounded by many other, similar stories, such as the National Student Ombudsman recently launching an investigation into allegations the University of Technology Sydney had failed to improve its policies and procedures for complaints of sexual harassment and assault despite four reviews since 2022. My story sits among thousands of others, each waiting for change to occur.

I am now about to enter what should have been my final year of study. In these past few years, I have worked tirelessly to change the system from within – through formal channels, advocacy and collaboration. As each attempt hits a wall, I am forced to ask myself: how much more harassment can I endure just to earn a degree?

This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on December 13, 2025 as "‘You’re dumb, but you’re a pretty girl’".

For almost a decade, The Saturday Paper has published Australia’s leading writers and thinkers. We have pursued stories that are ignored elsewhere, covering them with sensitivity and depth. We have done this on refugee policy, on government integrity, on robo-debt, on aged care, on climate change, on the pandemic.

All our journalism is fiercely independent. It relies on the support of readers. By subscribing to The Saturday Paper, you are ensuring that we can continue to produce essential, issue-defining coverage, to dig out stories that take time, to doggedly hold to account politicians and the political class.

There are very few titles that have the freedom and the space to produce journalism like this. In a country with a concentration of media ownership unlike anything else in the world, it is vitally important. Your subscription helps make it possible.

Send this article to a friend for free.