Speech after long silence: 2 original UPEI complainants tell their stories to board members

The University of Prince Edward Island says it's making good on a commitment it made more than a decade ago to two women who came forward in 2012 with complaints of sexual harassment against the university's former president.

The announcement came after a remarkable meeting Tuesday evening at which those two women — Wendy Carroll and Erin Casey — appeared in person to deliver victim impact statements to board of governors members behind closed doors.

After their presentation, Casey spoke briefly to reporters to deliver a prepared statement. She and Carroll declined requests to be interviewed.

"Sharing our stories is an important first step on a path of reflection and, we hope, reconciliation," Casey said, noting that the women had invited the board members "to witness the injustice we've experienced over the past decade" since making their complaints against Alaa Abd-El-Aziz.

Regarding the settlement agreement the two signed with the university in 2013, Casey said the university had never fulfilled one major condition: to implement a new policy with a mechanism for people "to report harassment and discrimination complaints against the president, whoever that might be."

Under the university's existing fair treatment policy, Casey noted, "the president is the final arbiter of all complaints."

Casey said the settlement agreement had required the policy to be adopted by Sept. 30, 2013.

"This agreement is a legally binding contract, but the policy was never adopted by the university," she said. 

"Not following through on this negotiated protection reinforced that reporting was not safe at UPEI. And for those witnessing our experience, it clearly showed what happens to women who report sexual harassment."

After the presentation by Casey and Carroll, the board voted to replace UPEI's fair treatment policy with a new harassment and discrimination policy, one that will incorporate not just the concerns the women raised in 2013, but also recommendations from the Rubin Thomlinson report.

That report, released in June after an independent investigation into allegations of harassment and a toxic work environment at Prince Edward Island's only university, led to the resignation of the board chair at the time and the vice-president at the time, Jackie Podger, going on administrative leave.

Podger and the university have since parted ways.

In a letter sent out Wednesday to the campus community on behalf of current board chair Shannon MacDonald, the university said the new policy will include specific provisions "regarding complaints against senior administrators." The letter said it will also conform with P.E.I.'s Occupational Health and Safety Act, and will be "trauma-informed and procedurally fair."

As well, the board voted to create a new "Campus Culture Oversight Committee," to provide oversight around implementation of recommendations from the Rubin Thomlinson report.

The board hired the Toronto-based law firm to carry out the review after a third woman came forward with a complaint of sexual harassment against Abd-El-Aziz in Dec. 2021.

The president, who had recently had his contract renewed by the board, resigned citing health reasons the same week.  

Casey and Carroll did not take part in the Rubin Thomlinson review because they were unable to negotiate a permanent release from the confidentiality requirements in their settlement with the university.

The university finally released them from their non-disclosure agreements in August 2023. But Abd-El-Aziz was also a signatory to the agreements and has not released the women from its restrictions. Thus they remain at risk of being sued by him for speaking about what happened to them.

Because they didn't participate in the review, Rubin Thomlinson concluded the firm was "unable to answer a key question that arises as part of our mandate: Did the former president engage in repeated sexual misconduct?"

'Painful process' for all

At the meeting Tuesday night, MacDonald had board members move their chairs from behind a horseshoe-shaped set of tables into the middle of the floor, to try to create a more relaxed, informal setting for the two women to deliver their statements.

She warned board members that the statements they were about to hear would be very sensitive and personal.

MacDonald said implementing the changes required in the wake of the Rubin Thomlinson report has been a "difficult, often painful process."

And she said part of that process is "working with those we have let down."

The board chair said that because they had signed NDAs, Casey and Carroll spent a decade facing down hundreds of questions they were not allowed to answer, forced to respond with "stone-cold silence" to a "swirl of misunderstanding and misinformation."

As one point of clarification, MacDonald told the board and reiterated in her letter to the campus community Wednesday that the money Casey and Carroll received as part of their settlement with UPEI "served merely to recover most of their legal fees, leaving them with a final disbursement of $6,500 each to address damages or for harm."

She also said that after settling their complaints, the two "felt they had little choice but to leave their homes, careers, and the UPEI community to start over in a different province." 

MacDonald said Tuesday night marked the first time in more than a decade either woman had been on the UPEI campus.

Asked by CBC News what role actions by the university had played in the decision by Casey and Carroll to leave, MacDonald said: "That's their story to tell, but as part of their coping and the way they addressed post-agreement, they felt it better in their families — that was the decision that they made."

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As to why it's taken the university a decade to agree to fulfil the commitment it made to the women in 2013 to implement a new harassment policy, MacDonald said the story is "long and complicated, and I'm not sure I could fully explain it. But I can say that we're committed to honouring that promise."

MacDonald was on the board of governors starting in 2017, though not its chair until this year. 

"The best I can do is take care of it in my own capacity today," she said.