Gender Discrimination and Incompetent Educators - Hurrah UC Davis Vet School!

According to a recent report a woman in the UC Davis Vet program gave birth and when she went to her professor to discuss her impending absences and how she might deal with it he, (a senior professor nonetheless!), was so flummoxed by the situation (has there never been a pregnant student in his entire time as a professor?) that he put 6 grading options for the new mother to a vote amongst the rest of the students. Read the full details here, it's pretty astounding.

I'm not sure which is worse:
 -that he is so narrow minded that he could not possibly think of a respectful way of dealing with this (talk to the student, come up with a make-up quiz schedule, give her a separate, comprehensive final exam? Really, a 1st quarter newly minted TA could come up with better options)
-that he humiliated her in front of her classmates
-that after belittling her, he then gave her classmates final judgment on her grade w/o any consideration of her actual work
-or, the final comments by UC Davis' administration :
We need to do everything we can to make academic careers much more appealing to the next generation of veterinarians - a generation that will predominantly be female. And on another level, the idea that young faculty should have to choose between family and career is antediluvian to me. It's a moral issue: the University should be doing everything possible to encourage faculty to achieve their academic potential while not forcing them to sacrifice their personal and family lives as well. I see the Work Life program as the first - but not the last - step in moving toward a more enlightened policy towards a family-friendly academic life.

As Isis the blogger points out: So only faculty get a family friendly policy? What happens if by the time you put off kids long enough to become faculty you are staring at thousands of dollars of painful and exhausting fertility treatments - if having kids is an option at all? Not that you have to have your own kids, I'm all for adoption, but adoption is not exactly a walk in the park either. Either way, the idea that all students put off child bearing completely while in profession school, which often coincides with a woman's most fertile years, is sexist. If only because it unfairly targets that half of the population who are the child bearers.

This actually seems to be one thing my dept really got right. I would not stretch to say that they encourage grads to start families, but on the whole they are supportive of those who do and do not stigmatize them while in the program.