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Kenneth Starr resigned as chancellor of Baylor University on Wednesday, a week after he stepped down as president amid allegations that the world’s largest Baptist university has continuously mishandled -- and sought to suppress public discourse about -- sexual assaults committed by its football players and other students.
Starr's resignation last week came at the urging of the university's Board of Regents, after a law firm hired by the university to investigate how it has handled allegations of sexual assault presented a lengthy oral report to the board summarizing its findings.
The firm found that university officials mishandled a number of reports of sexual violence and that there were several instances in which "football coaches or staff met directly with a complainant and/or parent of a complainant and did not report the misconduct." The football program, the university's summary of the findings stated, operated its own "internal system of discipline," that "resulted in conduct being ignored or players being dismissed from the team based on an informal and subjective process."
Baylor's board fired the university's head football coach on Thursday, and its athletic director, Ian McCaw, resigned on Monday. Starr was originally expected to resign as president, but remain at the university as chancellor and as a law professor. The board said Wednesday that Starr will now step down as chancellor immediately.
"We thank Judge Starr for his years of service," the Board of Regents said in a statement. "We recognize this is a tumultuous time for Baylor, most importantly for our current and former students and victims of sexual assault. We were horrified by what we learned from the investigation and again express our public acknowledgment and deepest apologies. The decisions made, and the actions we have taken, will ensure there is no room for deflection of responsibility or diminishing the experiences of the victims."
