Thursday 13-04-2017 - 10:00

By Katie Dragomirova, MDXSU Vice President Business and Law

 

Since I started as your Vice President Business and Law in July 2016, it has been high on my priority list to deliver a project that focused on addressing sexual harassment.

 

The aim of the Hear Me Out! campaign is to make both campus and our local area safer by tackling myths and misunderstandings about sexual violence, harassment and hate crime.

 

As we’re coming towards the end of the year, I wanted to update you on what has been done so far to tackle these issues on and off campus, and tell you about a grant of almost £50,000 that we have been awarded to fund this work.

 

Researching the issue

One of my first steps back in September was to recruit four Community Placement students to conduct research in this area, helping us to better understand what needed changing and how we would achieve that. These students looked at sexual harassment on campus and in the local community, analysed police statistics and looked into other work being done across the UK.

 

Their research quickly proved what we had expected, and underlined the importance of the campaign.

 

Our student researchers found that amongst current Middlesex University students, 86% had experienced some form of sexual harassment on or around campus, yet only 5% reported this to the University or local police. Of this 5%, none of the students were happy with how their report was handled.

 

More widely, last year there were 203 reports of rape and 347 of other sexual offences in our local borough of Barnet. Over the past five years, 472 rapes and 866 reports of sexual violence in Barnet have been unsolved, with just 74 rape reports resulting in a conviction.

 

Where we are now

In March, the Students' Union, Citizens UK and the university submitted a successful bid to the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) to fund many of the objectives of the Hear Me Out!  campaign.

 

We have been awarded £47,000 to deliver an exciting project that will tackle sexual violence, harassment and hate crime, both on campus and locally.

 

As part of this 18-month project, there will be compulsory training modules for students and staff on these issues, and behavioral policies will be updated to make sure reports are dealt with appropriately. A new online, interactive platform will also be created to support students, staff and locals in understanding, identifying, challenging and responding to these crimes, and access advice where necessary.

 

The safeguarding project will extend beyond campus, developing relationships with the local community in order to research experiences beyond the university and support organisations and community centres to deliver training and workshops, and improve Zero Tolerance policies.

 

We will also be working closely with the police to improve the reporting of cases and the experience of victims when they do report, building on the Police & Crime Consultation which took place on campus in February, where Deputy Mayor Sophie Linden spoke to staff, students and locals about her commitment to tackling violence against women, harassment and hate crime within the upcoming Crime & Policing Plan.

 

 

I am really excited to continue this work with Middlesex University and Citizens UK to make our campus and local community safer for everyone.

 

Thank you to all who have supported this campaign so far - if you would like to get involved moving forward, or would like some more information on the project, feel free to get in touch with me at e.dragomirova@mdx.ac.uk