He released a statement saying the university is looking into the appropriateness of the demonstration, where about 100 students in a psychology class witnessed a naked woman being penetrated by a sex toy. Schapiro called the decision by Professor J. Michael Bailey “extremely poor judgment.”

“Although the incident took place in an after-class session that students were not required to attend, and students were advised in advance, several times, of the explicit nature of the activity, I feel it represented extremely poor judgment on the part of our faculty member. I simply do not believe this was appropriate, necessary or in keeping with Northwestern University’s academic mission,” Schapiro said.

“Northwestern faculty members engage in teaching and research on a wide variety of topics, some of them controversial. That is the nature of a university. However, in this instance, I have directed that we investigate fully the specifics of this incident, and also clarify what constitutes appropriate pedagogy, both in this instance and in the future,” he said. “Many members of the Northwestern community are disturbed by what took place on our campus. So am I.”

Bailey has defended the demonstration. In a statement Wednesday night, he said “the students find the events to be quite valuable, typically, because engaging real people in conversation provides useful examples and extensions of concepts students learn about in traditional academic ways.”

Northwestern has acknowledged paying guest lecturer Ken Melvoin-Berg, co-owner of Weird Chicago Tours, several hundred dollars for a Feb. 21 discussion of bondage, swinging and other sexual fetishes where the demonstration took place.  Bailey gets extra funding from the university’s College of Arts & Sciences for lectures and other activities he routinely holds after class.

After an initial discussion at Ryan Family Auditorium, the class was told a couple was going to demonstrate the use of a sex toy and female orgasm. Both Professor Bailey and myself gave them five or six warnings about what was about to happen and it would be graphic,” Melvoin-Berg said.

The woman undressed and got on stage with her male partner, who used a device that looks like a machine-powered saw with a phallic object instead of a blade. Melvoin-Berg said the couple are exhibitionists who enjoy having people watch them have sex, and they were not paid for the demonstration.

Jim Marcus said he and his fiancé hadn’t planned to demonstrate the sex act at first, but decided to do so after the class watched a video on female orgasm that he thought was unrealistic. They already had brought the equipment to show as part of the discussion.  “It seems like a human sexuality class is a smart place to dispel some of the mistakes that we saw in the video,” said Marcus, a musician who also teaches sex education.

He said the demonstration with his fiancé, Faith Kroll, was different from a live sex show or pornography. “I was more than happy to. We have fun with it,” Kroll said. “I’m an exhibitionist. I enjoy the attention, being seen by other people. It was entertaining because there were a lot of curious minds, so that was cool.”

Marcus insisted that “what we did was not designed to titillate people, but to educate people,” noting that the demonstration was accompanied by a discussion about safety and consent, for example. “I hope (Bailey) doesn’t take a lot of flak for this,” Marcus said Wednesday night. “But I suspect he will.”

There were 567 students registered for Bailey’s class. According to a description of Bailey’s class, it “will treat human sexuality as a subject for scientific inquiry,” with topics including human mating, sexual arousal and sexual jealousy.

Bailey is no stranger to controversy. In 2003, he was criticized by several transsexual women who said they did not give him permission to use their stories in his book, “The Man who Would be Queen: The Science of Gender-Bending and Transsexualism.”

The academic world was buzzing over the Northwestern controversy, with articles posted at the Higher Chronicle of Education and Inside Higher Ed websites. The American Association of University Professors defines academic freedom as the freedom to teach, conduct research, address institutional policy and speak on broader social, economic and political interests, said Greg Scholtz, a director at the Washington-based organization. He declined to weigh in on the Northwestern controversy, but said “if a question arises as to the fitness of a faculty member, that question should be reviewed by his faculty peers.”

“First, academic freedom does not protect professional misconduct and incompetence in teaching research. The question is, who is to determine whether something is of a nature of misconduct or incompetence?”