No formal complaint triggered Wilfrid Laurier teaching assistant's censure

The president of Wilfrid Laurier University says a teaching assistant who was chastised for airing a debate clip featuring a controversial figure was disciplined by her supervisors even though no formal complaint was filed.

Deborah MacLatchy said in a statement Monday an independent fact-finder hired by the school found that no formal complaint or informal concern was ever raised about the class taught by Lindsay Shepherd.

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Shepherd was criticized by three Laurier staff members for failing to condemn the views of University of Toronto professor Jordan Peterson, who has refused to use gender-neutral pronouns. She screened a clip of a debate featuring the professor as part of a communications tutorial.

The university apologized to Shepherd last month after shediscreetly recorded the meeting with the staff members and releasedit publicly.

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MacLatchy said the staff members should not have met withShepherd and compounded their error by a misapplication of existinguniversity policies.

Shepherd had said she accepted and welcomed the apology, but feltit rang hollow coming on the heels of intensive media attentionaround her case.