The Leaning Committee’s recommendation—and Faculty’s adoption of them—earned nearly universal praise.

The committee helped to repair an atmosphere of trust and cooperation between students and faculty that had been shaken the previous spring.

“In a sense there had been a chasm that was unbridgeable [between students and faculty],” said Professor of the History of Science Everett I. Mendelsohn, a member of the Leaning Committee, at the May 6 Faculty meeting. “That has begun to change.”

Administrators also pledged support to the committee.

“It was an excellent report. It gives us some concrete steps we can really take,” said Dean of Undergraduate Education Benedict H. Gross ’71, who will assume the role of dean of the College in July, at an open forum to discuss the committee’s findings.

And at the May Faculty meeting, University President Lawrence H. Summers, who has sparred with student advocacy groups in the past, thanked the student activists for bringing the issue of sexual assault to the University’s attention.

Students, too, lauded the report’s findings on education and support, but said they continue to worry about the how victims are treated throughout the disciplinary process.

“The office has material and symbolic consequences,” said Alexandera Neuhaus-Follini ’04-’06, a CASV member, at the time of the report’s release. “Hopefully it will really translate into survivors having better experiences, and be part of a larger cultural shift.”

And the a new sexual assault policy, approved by the Faculty on May 20, requires students involved in these cases to provide “as much information as possible to support their allegations.”

While student activists say they see the changed wording—and the University’s commitment to using the single fact finder—as positive steps, they say they are suspicious of any evidentiary requirement for cases to be brought forward.

“CASV still believes that requiring corroboration, no matter what it is called, is bad and prevents survivors from coming forward,” Alisha C. Johnson ’04, a member of CASV, said in April.

CASV members continue to call for a committee to review more thoroughly the  Ad Board and discipline in general.

Still, students said they hope that the full implementation of the Leaning Committee’s report means they won’t have to rally again.

“In May of 2004 I hope that I won’t have to be standing here,” said CASV member Madeleine S. Elfenbein, who spoke at both this year’s and last year’s rallies. “Its been a year of leaps and bounds.”

—Staff writer Sarah M. Seltzer can be reached at sseltzer@fas.harvard.edu.