Citadel’s Timing Criticized Women Admitted Too Soon After Court Battle, Panel Says

The Citadel should have waited longer after a court battle before admitting four women cadets, two of whom later charged they were harassed and hazed, a school-appointed committee said Tuesday.

The state military college announced last week that one male cadet had been dismissed, three resigned, and 10 others were given lesser punishments for hazing and harassing two female cadets. One male cadet was cleared.

The Citadel changed its all-male admissions policy last summer, two days after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled a similar all-male policy at Virginia Military Institute was unconstitutional. Just six weeks later, four women were on campus.

“We believe the college should have waited a year before bringing them in,” former Citadel President James Grimsley said today. That would have allowed time to recruit more women and to better judge how the plan would work, he said.

Grimsley was among a group of community leaders asked in January to review the school’s plan for admitting and training women.

Two of the women, Jeanie Mentavlos and Kim Messer, left school after the first semester, saying they had been hazed and harassed.

They said their clothes were set on fire while they were wearing them and cleanser was poured on their heads, they were forced to drink alcohol and forced to stand in a closet while being shoved and kicked.

The Citadel still has two female cadets.

The committee led by Grimsley also said the Citadel’s governing board needs to better state how the school should function as a co-educational college. It also called for a review of freshman training.