Based on recommendations by a working group formed in November to assess the efficacy of the University’s bias reporting system, Public Safety Alerts will undergo several changes in the spring semester. The alerts, which previously included only robberies and assaults, will now notify students of incidents of bias and will be available every day of the week.
The new Public Safety Alerts will also include a link to the Bias Reporting System, which the working group—which was formed in response to GU Pride demands after September’s alleged hate crime against an LGBTQ student—hopes will consolidate the two processes into one more transparent notification system.
“The group didn’t want multiple communication processes,” University spokesperson Julie Bataille, who also served on the Working Group, said.
Speaking on behalf of the entire group, Bataille said that they completed their recommendations in December and plan to report on the final status of their proposal at the end of January.
“We came up with recommendations that enable us to develop a common approach of notifying the community,” Bataille said.
One of the group’s most significant proposed changes is to expand the group that reviews the bias incident notifications to permanently include members of the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity, and Affirmative Action, along with representatives from the Office of Student Affairs and the Office of Communications.
Because it is difficult to determine the definition of a hate or bias incident, according to Bataille, it is important for individuals who are sensitive to the topic, such as specially-trained DPS officers, to review the notifications of bias incidents.
Other changes suggested by the working group include an addition to the Undergraduate Bulletin, which will encourage students to report a “hostile classroom climate that is inconsistent with the free and respectful exchange of ideas,” to department chairs and school deans, according to a letter written by the Working Group in December to Vice President for Public Affairs and Strategic Development Dan Porterfield and Vice President for Institutional Diversity Rosemary Kilkenny, head coordinators of all three working groups.
The official recommendation also proposes that a new link, labeled “Bias/Discrimination,” be added on the first student page that follows from the “Current Students” link on the University’s main webpage and also on students’ Blackboard page, if possible.
“We want to make students aware of their options whether or not they want to go to DPS about the incident,” Bataille said.
The working group met over the course of last semester, and in its final proposal made suggestions to the other working groups, also formed in response to GU Pride’s demands.
The Working Group on Education was created to consider the needs of LGBTQ-related education, and the Working Group on Resources was formed to discuss the development of a full-time resource center.
This included a recommendation that the Education Working Group consider ways to make all of the information in the proposed “Bias/Discrimination” webpage available to freshmen during New Student Orientation. A subcommittee formed within the group will report at the end of January on the acceptance and implementation of these recommendations.
