Sorbonne Apologizes For Lecturer Who Told Student Remove Headscarf

The head of France's Sorbonne University has personally apologized to a student for one of the university's lecturers who told a Muslim student to take off her headscarf during her lessons or leave the class.

According to a news report in the country's Le Monde newspaper on Monday, the university's rector, Philippe Boutry, assured the student and the Muslim community that an incident like that would never happen again.

The news report said the lecturer told one of her female students to take her Muslim veil off or to leave the class, asking: “Are you planning to keep this thing on throughout my classes? It is disturbing. I am here to help you to integrate you into the society, and that [the veil] will cause problems for you.”

In response to the lecturer, the female student said she had a right to come to class with her headscarf. Upon hearing the student's response, the lecturer suggested the student select another class instead of attending her classes.

In the wake of the verbal harassment she faced, the student left the class and wrote a letter of complaint to Yann Richard, the department head. Richard recommended that she choose another class to solve the problem. That suggestion wouldn't have worked, however, as the student would have had to take several compulsory classes from the same lecturer over the coming semesters. The student then took the problem to the university's administration.

The rector released a statement apologizing to the student and assured her that a problem like this would never occur again, adding, "The problem emerged because the lecturer misinterpreted a law enacted in 2004 [banning the headscarf and religious symbols in all middle and high schools]."

However, in her letter to the university the student said the lecturer knew wearing the veil was allowed at university but said that if it was up to her, it wouldn't be.

France is known for its strict secular implementations in public such as banning the burqa and other religious symbols affiliated with any religion, and the French government, through a controversial law in 2004, banned wearing a headscarf and having religious symbols in schools across the country, despite the fact that ban does not include universities.

(Cihan/Today's Zaman)