Marlene Jupiter ’78 was a founding member of the President’s Council of Cornell Women. She currently serves on the advisory council for Entrepreneurship at Cornell and as President of the Fort Lauderdale/Boca Raton Cornell Club. She can be reached at marlenejupiter@yahoo.com.
As a proud member of the Cornell class of 1978, a founding member of the President’s Council of Cornell Women and a dedicated volunteer and donor for over three decades, I am writing with a profoundly heavy heart.
My journey began in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology, where I studied nutrition before making an about-face into finance, ultimately culminating in a career as a managing director at a prominent hedge fund. Throughout my life, I have championed women — mentoring students, serving as a big sister to female undergraduates and authoring a book to empower women to take control of their financial destinies. I have always believed deeply in Cornell’s promise: “to do the greatest good.”
That is why the recent fraternity incident — and the University’s response — has left me heartbroken and fundamentally questioning whether our decades of work toward women’s equality and safety were in vain.
50 years ago, campus culture was far from perfect. Date rape occurred, often shrouded in the fog of alcohol and regret. But I do not recall anything of this horrendous, graphic nature. The reported gang rape, accompanied by vile Snapchat broadcasts advertising a woman as "free," is not a youthful mistake. Even in the most competitive, high-stakes environments of Wall Street, such behavior would be recognized as monstrous and intolerable.
Equally disturbing is the University’s reported response. If the press reports are accurate, the leniency shown to these perpetrators is reprehensible. Failing to immediately refer a criminal act of this magnitude to the Tompkins County Police Department suggests an ingrained, establishment belief that an Ivy League pedigree shields individuals from the rule of law. To imply that a woman’s inebriation somehow mitigates the crime or protects perpetrators from prosecution effectively delegitimizes the safety of half the student body.
We have made tremendous societal strides: Women now serve on the Supreme Court, run major corporations, lead university systems and campaign for the presidency. Yet on our campus, a regression of basic human decency is taking place. According to Cornell’s own 2025 survey, 35% of undergraduate women reported experiencing nonconsensual sexual contact during their time at the University. In my undergraduate days, my personal estimation was that this figure was closer to 10%.
This is not just a policy failure; it is a moral failure. It reflects a growing lack of respect — for women, for peers, for faculty and for the institution itself.
I feel deeply for Jane Doe. No financial compensation can restore her stolen peace, heal her shattered trust or undo the post-traumatic stress she will carry. She made the mistake of drinking too much — a mistake countless young adults make in search of connection, romance and belonging — and in return, her life was irreparably altered.
Cornell gave me the foundation for an extraordinary life, opening doors that allowed me to rise from a typist to an executive. I love this University, which makes this moment all the more painful.
I beseech the leadership, faculty, students and alumni to take decisive, uncompromising action. We need to get to the truth, and if it does seem as horrific, then we must hold the perpetrators accountable to the fullest extent of the law, demand absolute respect across our campus and rebuild a culture grounded in integrity and basic human kindness.
If we truly want to change the world, we must start by restoring honor and safety to our own home.
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