‘HORRIBLE NIGHTMARE’

Student Claims Christian College Disciplined Her After She Reported Her Assault

Mara Louk says Visible Music College barred her from campus for premarital sex after she told them she was raped

A 22-year-old woman claims her conservative Christian college disciplined her for supposedly having premarital sex after she reported a sexual assault.

Former Visible Music College student Mara Louk filed a complaint with the Department of Education on Wednesday, claiming the school refused to remove her alleged assailant from her classes or even investigate the alleged rape, according to NBC News.

The complaint claims Louk was assaulted by a fellow student at her off-campus apartment on Nov. 2, 2021. Louk says she reported the assault to an administrator the next day and filed a report with Memphis police on Nov. 4.

A week later, the police department told Louk they would not be making an arrest, citing insufficient evidence. Shortly thereafter, she says, a college administrator declined to remove the alleged assailant from her classes, saying there was “really nothing we can do at this point.” On Nov. 24, the school told her it would not be investigating her alleged assault at all because it occurred off campus.

In a meeting with Louk and her parents, the complaint claims, administrators also accused Louk of sleeping with an ex-boyfriend that same semester, violating the college’s rules against premarital sex. The administrator said her alleged assailant had told them about the incident and that her ex-boyfriend had confirmed it, the complaint says.

Louk says she denied the allegation, but that the school still attempted to make her sign a “pastoral care contract” confessing to it. The contract would also have required Louk to finish her degree online and barred her from speaking to other students about the alleged assault—restrictions the school said would provide her “some needed structure,” and ensured she addressed the “spiritual and emotional issues behind the infringements.”

“It didn’t seem real; it didn’t feel real,” Louk told NBC. “I kept thinking this is just a crazy, horrible nightmare, and hopefully one day I’ll wake up from it.”

Louk, who was majoring in modern music and was nine credits short of graduation, refused to sign the contract. She finished the semester, withdrew from college, and moved home to Iowa. She is asking the Department of Education to investigate whether the school discriminated against her based on her gender, and whether they violated federal rules around responding to college sexual assaults.

Visible is a private, Christian music college based in Memphis, Tennessee, with approximately 120 students. It was founded in 2000 by Dr. Ken Steorts of the Christian rock band Skillet.

The school did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Daily Beast. Steorts told NBC that the school could not comment on student matters and had not seen a copy of the complaint, but would cooperate with any investigation into the allegations.

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Emily ShugermanSenior Reporter

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