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fact that Universities and other organizations employ me or have me on their boards, or invite me to meetings is because they value my contributions and my actions. The items you list are false or distorted. Item 1 refers to a consensual encounter in my hotel room in 2006 where we mutually decided, in a polite discussion in fact, that taking it any further would not be appropriate, and there were respectful and platonic encounters afterwards. There is nothing to comment on in item 3, which involves an anonymous 3rd party claim because I know nothing about it, there are no details provided, and it clearly was not taken seriously enough to result in any university action. Item 4 is confusing. Are you saying that because I decided I didn’t want to go out to a bar with a group of attendees that I was harassing them? The second part did not happen. Re incident 5: The ‘female companion’ in this case is my wife, who accompanied me on the cruise, and has attested to the fact that the claim is false. This is what I wrote at the time in response to the blog in question, causing it to be taken down. It is worth responding to Item 2 and 6 in more detail, Re item 2: the student in question was interested in science communication, and on dozens of occasions came to me, asked me to talk over coffee, or wrote to me with questions. When she asked about advice for after graduation I DID tell her she was different than the other students in her year. The rest of them were interested in going on to graduate school in physics, but she was interested in science communication so | told her that she might want to take a different path. Since she was the only woman in her year, as I recall, I did ask her on one of these occasions if that made it difficult for her in any way. I asked, because as a faculty member and department chair I was interested in knowing what we could do, if necessary to encourage more women to go into physics, and also because as someone she had asked for career advice from I wanted to know if that made a difference to her. Re asking her for dinner.. I have gone back over emails from that period. I have numerous requests from her asking me to go for coffee to talk, which I usually had to turn down because I was busy, and on several occasions she asked me to have coffee with her off campus to talk, and I politely declined. I did let her accompany me off campus one time to watch me do a BBC interview because she specifically requested it, and I believe she found it useful. I did and do have coffee and meals with students on campus, and I see nothing wrong with this. I try to treat students as respected colleagues if possible. I was shocked when I later learned of the complaint she was apparently asked to lodge to the University, not least because there was no inappropriate interaction but also because, well after the dates you listed on which she was apparently offended, she continued to email me with joking questions or comments. Also, at a later AAAS conference, again in 2008, for which she had asked, and for which I had written her a letter of recommendation to attend, my wife and I gave her a lift in our taxi well out out of our way in order to drop her off at her hotel, and I note in an email response to her email about the conference, again in 2008, I expressed that I would pass her regards along to my wife and vice versa. When the University later informed me of the complaint I was shocked and concerned. When I spoke to the human resources person, including relating my concerns and explaining the situation, I was told that no formal complaint of sexual harassment was requested. By that time I learned of the complaint I had already announced my intentions to leave Case to accept an offer at ASU—a very difficult decision for me because of my long-standing attachment to the University, the excellent relations I had with my colleagues there— both among the faculty (many of whom in physics I had hired while department chair)) and among the administration, along with a very attractive counter-offer by Case. Because I was already in Arizona at the later time I was asked not to have any further interaction with the student I agreed to that request, both to respect her sensitivities and also because it was basically moot because I was not on campus. Following this episode, as indicated in the letter to the student, I did assess what might have led to misinterpretations by this student, and became more careful in offering advice when talking to students. I was also told by human resources that because it was decided to handle this informally and not formally, that (a) it should remain confidential, which I, at least abided by, and (b) if no further complaints were lodged in that case, that the University would preserve its confidentiality and remove the complaint from my record after 5 years, which makes me surprised and concerned that someone violated that written agreement with you. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_026769