Wheaton is the Cornell of evangelical schools

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(RNS) — As the Cornell University sexual assault case dominated headlines last week, I joined over 50 Wheaton College alumni, students and supporters for an unorthodox Homecoming Weekend event on Saturday (Oct. 3): a protest to decry the evangelical college’s systemic mishandling of sexual abuse.

In 1998, just six years before I arrived at Wheaton College as a student, three male students independently told Wheaton’s dean of students, Sam Shellhammer, that Dennis Massaro, who ran the college’s Office of Christian Outreach, had sexually assaulted them, news outlets later reported.

After Massaro confessed to molesting students over many years, an alumni-led petition noted that college administrators “should have assisted known victims in pursuing justice and made every reasonable effort to identify others who may have been harmed.” Federal guidelines passed in 1992 mandate exactly this response, but Wheaton didn’t follow those standards. Massaro was quietly terminated with a financial settlement and a non-disclosure agreement.

Former college President Duane Litfin did not inform the…