Curley, also doing the minimum legal requirement, told Senior Vice President for Finance and Business Gary Schultz. Curley and Schultz later told the graduate assistant that Sandusky’s locker room access had been revoked.

The incident never was reported to university police by Paterno, Curley, or Schultz, in violation of Pennsylvania law. Also, according to the Pennsylvania grand jury investigation, no one at any level of school administration asked for further details.

In light of these recent events, it is time for MSU to re-examine its policy on reporting the alleged crimes committed by MSU employees.

Accountability often is talked about with respect to student-athletes regarding off-the-field activities. Incidents such as the one at Penn State show there needs to be accountability at all levels of athletic, academic and administrative positions at MSU.

Sandusky allegedly assaulted at least eight victims and had been under investigation from a Pennsylvania grand jury for 18 months prior to being charged Nov. 5.

Now, the Penn State Board of Trustees appears ready to replace the individuals involved with the scandal in the athletic department and presidency at Penn State, but that is too little, too late.

Everyone would like to think these disgusting actions don’t happen anywhere. If an abuse of power by anyone associated with MSU were to happen on MSU’s campus, we hope any witness would be willing to bring the matter to the authorities, who would then investigate.

There are some reasons to think what happened at Penn State could happen at MSU.

Multiple members of the football team were involved in a fight at Rather Hall in November 2009. After a report by The State News, the athletics department was forced to take a stance on the fight, and members of the football team were prosecuted and punished by MSU police.

In August 2010, when there was an incident involving MSU basketball players and an alleged sexual assault, the incident was reported in the media, and the case went to the Ingham County Police, and prosecutors determined “no crime was committed.”

There shouldn’t have to be press involved for the truth to come out at MSU. At the beginning of the situation at Penn State, local police were not involved at all. In both cases at MSU, law enforcement was involved from the beginning, but the athletics department refrained from taking immediate action until after widespread media attention.

Although those relatively recent incidents involved players, who are not high-ranking members of the football and athletic departments, they show a commitment from the MSU athletics department and the administration to report wrongdoings to the proper authorities.

Students, faculty, staff and alumni deserve to be shown that the lack of administrative accountability shown at Penn State is not in place at MSU. Reevaluating the policy on reporting crimes committed by MSU employees, and legally obligating people to contact the authorities is an excellent way to do that.