Harvard Rule Banning Single-Sex Club Members From Leadership Positions Sees Some Backlash

CAMBRIDGE (CBS) -- Harvard University announced last week that it was barring members of single-sex only social clubs from serving as sports captains or leaders of other campus groups, effective in the fall of 2017.  But some on campus aren't happy about that.

A segment on CBS This Morning Tuesday showed backlash to the university's decision is building.

"Female spaces are crucial sources of our empowerment," chanted Caroline Tervo, as 400 female students protested the university's decision Monday on campus.

"They feel like their voices haven't really been heard in the decision the university made Friday," Tervo said. "I think there is something to be said for single-sex organizations."

Tervo added she felt "heartbroken" that female students in the future would not be able to experience the same opportunities she says membership in a women-only club provided her.

The university stopped officially recognizing these single-gender social clubs in 1984, when they refused to admit women. Friday's decision in part stems from a Harvard sexual assault task force report that concluded single-gender clubs contributed to sexual assaults on campus.

That report found that "female Harvard College students participating in final club activities are more likely to be sexually assaulted than participants in any other of the student organizations."

Last month, Charlie Storey, president of Boston's Harpoon Brewery and graduate president of the 225-year-old, men-only Porcellian Club, faced criticism for saying that forcing clubs to include women "could potentially increase, not decrease the potential for sexual misconduct." He later issued an apology for his statements and resigned from the club.

"A truly inclusive community requires that students have the opportunity to participate in the life of the campus free from exclusion on arbitrary grounds," Harvard President Drew Faust said in a statement about the school's decision Friday.

But the graduate president of the all-male Fly Club, Rick Porteus, told CBS News that he thought the new rules unfairly extended from the all-male clubs to other organizations.

"I think the target all along has been the well-established men's clubs," said Porteus. "And unfortunately and unconscionably, collateral damage has included the women's clubs as well as the sororities and the fraternities."

Porteus previously told WBZ that legal action against the university over the rule was a possibility, adding that he didn't think the rules would last beyond the current administration, and that he is "someone who believes in the value of single gender experiences as part of one's life."

The new university rules apply to all single-gender clubs, including fraternities and sororities. Membership in the single-sex clubs, as well as sororities and fraternities, is not made public--so it is not yet known how many people are affected, or how the university would enforce its new rules.