Sexual Violence and Crisis Communication in Higher Education

In the modern landscape of higher education, Title IX and sexual violence prevention and response are increasingly important to universities. Unfortunately, too often university leaders respond retroactively and poorly to sexual violence on their campuses. Harris (2019) utilizes a unique approach to organizational communication theory to argue that institutions create a rape culture in a society that blames individuals, rather than organizations, for sexual misconduct. Bataille and Cordova (2014) complement this research with a collection of essays advising university leaders how to practice effective crisis communication. Together, these books create discourse around how sexual violence and communication are related to the responses of university leadership and the system of shared governance within higher education. University leaders need to confront their institutions’ participation in producing rape culture and educate themselves on how to perform effective crisis communication around sexual violence.

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Campus Sexual Violence and Title IX: What is the Role of Restorative Justice Now?

Feminist Criminology ◽

10.1177/15570851211062643 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 155708512110626

Author(s):

Shauntey James ◽

Melanie D. Hetzel-Riggin

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Distributive Justice ◽

Sexual Violence ◽

Restorative Justice ◽

Title Ix ◽

Sexual Misconduct ◽

College Campuses ◽

Institutions Of Higher Education ◽

Advantages And Disadvantages

Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) have used restorative justice (RJ) to address sexual misconduct on college campuses under Title IX. In 2020, Title IX guidance was codified. The application of RJ under the new policy may create procedural and distributive justice issues. This article (1) defines the new policy; (2) explores suitability of RJ to sexual misconduct and specifically yellow zone behavior under the new policy; (3) discusses justice for the various stakeholders under the guise of advantages and disadvantages; and (4) makes recommendations to strengthen the choice of either implementing or not implementing restorative justice.

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Developing generic skills for students via extra-curricular activities in Vietnamese universities: Practices and influential factors

Journal of Teaching and Learning for Graduate Employability ◽

10.21153/jtlge2017vol8no1art624 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 8 (1) ◽

pp. 22-39 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Tran Le Huu Nghia

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Influential Factors ◽

Skills Development ◽

Development Programs ◽

University Leadership ◽

Generic Skills ◽

Factors Influencing ◽

Extra Curricular Activities ◽

External Stakeholders ◽

University Leaders

Developing generic skills (GS) for students has become central in many higher education curricula lately. However, there is still a lack of studies regarding how these skills are developed for students, especially those in developing countries. Drawing from a PhD study, this article reports the contribution of extra-curricular activities in developing GS for students in Vietnamese universities and analyses factors influencing the effectiveness of developing GS for students via these activities. A content analysis of relevant documents and 69 interviews with university leaders, academics and organisers of the Youth union and its associates (YUA) showed that extra-curricular activities were involved as an integral component of a university’s strategy for training students in GS. This was due to a lack of curriculum autonomy, which restricted most Vietnamese universities from adding skills subjects into the curriculum, and the YUA also had a long-standing tradition of developing non-discipline-specific skills for students. The YUA were found to successfully develop GS for students via extra-curricular activities; however, their operation was influenced by university leadership, student participation, external stakeholders’ support, and the leadership of the YUA. The article argues that extra-curricular activities were conducive to developing GS for students; therefore, they should be included in student skills development programs in higher education.

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Catalysts and rationales for reporting staff sexual misconduct to UK higher education institutions

Journal of Gender-Based Violence ◽

10.1332/239868021x16270572218631 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Anna Bull

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Decision Making ◽

Sexual Violence ◽

Higher Education Institutions ◽

Sexual Misconduct ◽

Early Career ◽

Third Party ◽

The Uk ◽

Different Levels ◽

Over Time

The majority of research on reporting of sexual violence and harassment has focused on reasons why women don’t report their experiences rather than examining why they do. This article takes this discussion into the higher education setting, drawing on interviews with 16 students and early career researchers in the UK who considered or attempted to report staff sexual misconduct to their institution and analysing their motivations for doing so. The motivations are broken down into two aspects: the immediate catalysts that triggered the report or disclosure, and the deeper rationales for why interviewees made this decision. Separating catalysts and rationales for reporting in this way allows different levels of decision-making over time to become clearer. Interviewees’ catalysts for reporting included leaving their institution, needing an extension on an assignment, protecting their own physical safety, or being validated by a third party. By contrast, the main rationale that interviewees gave for trying to report staff sexual misconduct was to prevent other women being targeted. Further rationales identified were fighting injustice and reporting for academic or career-related reasons. Higher education institutions’ policies and practices in this area need to take into account these different levels of decision-making around disclosure and reporting. Key messages <ul><li>There is much less research examining the reasons why victim-survivors do not report sexual violence and harassment than the reasons why they do report.</li> <li>In this study of students and staff who reported staff sexual misconduct to their university, the main rationale that interviewees gave for trying to report was to prevent other women being targeted.</li> <li>The article argues that separating catalysts for reporting from rationales makes visible different levels of decision-making over time.</li></ul>

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Rules versus relationships and campus sexual misconduct

International Journal of Organization Theory and Behavior ◽

10.1108/ijotb-09-2018-0100 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 22 (3) ◽

pp. 226-241

Author(s):

Brian Pappas

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Title Ix ◽

Design Methodology ◽

Sexual Misconduct ◽

Institutions Of Higher Education ◽

Content Type ◽

Institutional Authority ◽

University Leaders ◽

Relational Strategies

Purpose How do university compliance administrators implement the rules prohibiting campus sexual misconduct? Title IX Coordinators’ authority is legal–rational and derives from the power to enforce Title IX and university rules. The paper aims to discuss this issue. Design/methodology/approach Analyzing narratives collected from administrators at 22 large institutions of higher education, this paper distinguishes rules from relationship-oriented Coordinators and develops an understanding of how and why Title IX Coordinators utilize relational authority as they implement Title IX. Findings The key finding is that relational administrators exhibit less institutional authority than their rules-based counterparts and focus on their relationships with complainants and respondents over university leaders and administrators. Originality/value While other researchers have focused on rules, this research demonstrates how Title IX Coordinators draw heavily on relational strategies.

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How to lead a successful university transformation: The case of École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)

Educational Management Administration & Leadership ◽

10.1177/1741143220953600 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 174114322095360

Author(s):

Xiaohua Jiang

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Change Management ◽

Management Strategies ◽

Transformational Change ◽

Change Model ◽

University Administrators ◽

University Leadership ◽

Education Market ◽

University Leaders ◽

École Polytechnique

Research universities worldwide have been taking reform actions to enhance their competitiveness in the global higher education market; however, the implementation of new initiatives may lead to challenges for university leadership. Faculty resistance is regarded as one of the most common obstacles faced by university leaders. Taking a qualitative approach based on Kotter’s leading change model, this study adopts École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne as a case study to explore change management strategies adopted by university leadership in an attempt to ensure a planned transformational change. By analysing 22 interviews with university administrators and faculty members, this study reveals that the president of École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne managed changes through approaches that included vision creation, coalition formation, communication, faculty empowerment and culture consolidation. Additionally, the study shows that Kotter’s change model, which was designed for business organizations, could not be applied to the analysis of the change management process in the context of higher education without modifications due to institutional and cultural differences.

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The Governance of Complaints in UK Higher Education: Critically Examining ‘Remedies’ for Staff Sexual Misconduct

Social & Legal Studies ◽

10.1177/09646639211002243 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 096466392110022

Author(s):

Anna Bull ◽

Tiffany Page

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Sexual Violence ◽

Sexual Misconduct ◽

Critical Scrutiny ◽

Uk Higher Education ◽

Administrative Justice

Complaints processes and their governance in UK higher education (HE) have received little critical scrutiny, despite their expanded role under the increasing marketisation of HE. This article draws on interviews with students who attempted to make complaints of staff sexual misconduct to their HE institution. It outlines four groups among the interviewees according to the ‘remedy’ that they obtained, describing how most interviewees could not access the services of the Office of the Independent Adjudicator for Higher Education in England as they could not complete internal institutional complaints processes. The failure of most complainants to obtain remedy, and the difficult experiences of those who did, reveals the inadequacies of using an individualist, consumer-oriented model for addressing discrimination complaints in HE. The article also contributes to discussions of justice for sexual violence survivors, suggesting that community-oriented remedies are needed alongside formal administrative justice processes to address power-based sexual misconduct in institutions.

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Terca, pero no pendeja: Terquedad as Theory and Praxis of Transformative Gestures in Higher Education

Association of Mexican American Educators Journal ◽

10.24974/amae.14.2.357 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 14 (2) ◽

pp. 23-43

Author(s):

Omi S. Salas-SantaCruz

Keyword(s):

Higher Education ◽

Sexual Violence ◽

Doctoral Student ◽

Power Structures ◽

The University

In this article, the author explores the concept of terquedad or waywardness as a blueprint towards gender/queer justice in education. Using María Lugones’s (2003) theorizing resistance against multiple oppressions, the author presents Gloria Anzaldúa’s' writings in Borderlands/La Frontera (1987) and This Bridge Called My Back (1981/2015) as a project of storying the plurality of terquedad. In doing so, the author calls for a theory and praxis of terquedad as a framework to understand the embodied resistances queer and trans-Latinx/e students deploy as textual inconveniences to push back and resist the “institutional grammars” of U.S. universities (Crawford & Ostrom, 1995; Bonilla-Silva, 2012). Through a plática methodology (Fierros & Delgado Bernal, 2016), the author introduces Quiahuitl, a doctoral student engaging with a praxis of terquedad when confronted with institutional and sexual violence as she moves within and against the geographies and power structures of the university.

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Self-affirmation and False Allegations: The Effects on Responses to Disclosures of Sexual Victimization

Journal of Interpersonal Violence ◽

10.1177/0886260520980387 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 088626052098038

Author(s):

Melissa S. de Roos ◽

Daniel N. Jones

Keyword(s):

Sexual Violence ◽

Online Survey ◽

Sexual Victimization ◽

Sexual Misconduct ◽

News Article ◽

Child Victims ◽

False Allegations ◽

False Accusation ◽

Amazon's Mechanical Turk ◽

False Accusations

The rise of the #MeToo movement highlights the prevalence of sexual victimization and gives a voice to victims who may have been silent before. Nevertheless, survivors or victims of sexual violence who come forward may be blamed or not believed. These reactions are evident both with adult and child victims. Further, fears about false accusations of sexual misconduct may negatively impact responses to disclosures. This study aimed to examine gender differences in perceptions toward the #MeToo movement, and the extent to which these translate into a skeptical response to disclosure. Further, we wanted to explore whether proximity to false allegations of sexual violence was linked with more negative responses and whether use of self-affirmations may decrease the likelihood of such a response. Through an online survey ( N = 235) on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, we assessed participants’ exposure to and perceptions of the #MeToo movement. Further, we asked them about their proximity to sexual violence (victimization or perpetration) and to false allegations. Using a threat manipulation (news article about false accusation) and a self-affirmation exercise, we studied the effects of both variables on responses to disclosure. Results indicated that after reading an article about a false accusation, male participants were more likely to blame a victim of childhood sexual abuse and to perceive the abuse as less harmful, compared with female participants. Further, we found that self-affirmation was linked with more supportive responses to a disclosure. These findings highlight the threatening nature of false accusations of sexual violence for men, and how this threat may shape the narrative regarding sexual violence. Opportunities to use self-affirmation to change this narrative to a more supportive one are discussed.

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