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Instead, the professor ignored the Dean’s order and, last week, took the issue to the media.

As Mr. Grayson wrote in an October letter to the university’s president, “I do not believe that we want to be known as a university in which the rights of female students can be compromised by religious concerns.”

The student, meanwhile, respected the professor’s decision and attended the group sessions without complaint.

Last week, Mr. Grayson confirmed that the Dean’s order remained outstanding.

In Friday’s letter, leaked to the National Post, Mr. Singer expressed his “sincere regret” at the issue, but maintained that since the measure would not have had a “substantial impact” on the other students in the course — which was online — he was bound by the Ontario Human Rights Code to have the request fulfilled.

“I am dismayed that the decision to accommodate has been characterized as an endorsement of the student’s belief system, and as a betrayal of York’s decades long efforts toward gender equity,” he wrote.

As outlined in the two-page letter, at the crux of the Dean’s controversial decision was the fact that Mr. Grayson had already allowed another student in the online course to make alternative arrangements for the group assignment.

The student lived outside the country and could not physically meet with other students. Nevertheless, since that student had apparently skipped the group assignment without having a “substantial impact” on the other students, Mr. Singer concluded that “the sole grounds for different treatment was the professor’s disapproval of the student’s beliefs.”