Eleven acts of rape or attempted rape, committed between September 2018 and February 2022, were reported within the École polytechnique, in an *internal investigation of the establishment carried out between January and February last, to which franceinfo was able have access this Tuesday, thus confirming information from the newspaper The world.
At the question : “During your schooling at École Polytechnique, did anyone try or manage to have sex with you against your will?”, ten students, the vast majority of them female, answer “Yes one time”a person responds “Yes several times”. They are ten women and one man. Each time, the aggressor is a man.
The report also reveals that almost one in four female students surveyed (23.1%) claim to have been the victim of a sexual assault since the start of their studies at the establishment. The pupils concerned speak in particular of touching, without their consent, on their breasts or buttocks, or of situations in which they have been “stuck” to be kissed.
Fifteen reports, the vast majority of students, evoke cases of forced “sexual touching”. Three young people also say they were drugged without their knowledge during an alcoholic student party. The survey also sheds light on fifty reports, again overwhelmingly made by female students, of a “a sexual act performed when consent was not full and complete.”
“We didn’t expect to have so many cases.explains to franceinfo the director general of the École polytechnique, François Bouchet. We were very shocked by the results.” The manager explains that “as soon as the results are known”a report was made to the Essonne public prosecutor. “We are doing everything to ensure that there are never any more such acts in our school. Obviously, we want legal actionadds the director. However, as it stands, we can only report cases that are anonymous. We can only encourage the victims, and the witnesses, to declare what they lived, what they saw.”
The École Polytechnique notes in this report that there are “a very strong correlation between alcohol consumption and sexual or gender-based abuse”. The results of this questionnaire “must heighten everyone’s awareness”continues the establishment, which will renew this survey on a regular basis and which will organize, “as soon as possible”, obligatory workshops for students. The Ecole Polytechnique also talks about “put in place precautionary measures as soon as possible”as well as “disciplinary sanctions where possible without impeding the course of justice”.
*This internal survey was conducted by the establishment between January 19 and February 6, 2022. 2,097 students took part in this survey, i.e. a participation rate of 61%.