UNC faculty take on sexual assault modules

Since its December rollout, more than 70 percent of faculty and staff members have completed the University’s required sexual assault modules.

At the Board of Trustees’ University Affairs committee meeting, Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Winston Crisp pointed out the work UNC has done to address Title IX and sexual violence issues.

The University’s new policy rolled out at the beginning of the school year, but Crisp said administrators are still working hard to finish out those cases that began under the old policy.

The new policy requires mandatory training for faculty and students. Crisp said he expects all employees to complete the modules soon.

Crisp said they are still in the early stages with the student training, as students received notification of it Jan. 12.

He also cited the University’s decision to participate in a controversial sexual assault climate survey by the Association of American Universities.

Chancellor Carol Folt said the AAU wanted to share best practices, create a survey and look at the results to see what was working.

Besides addressing issues of sexual assault, Crisp said the University just completed a review of a national study on hazing and plans to look at hazing in the Greek community, clubs and athletic teams. He and Provost Jim Dean are also working on a campus-wide group that will research best practices and policies to address binge drinking and substance abuse.

Faculty Chairman Bruce Cairns said the Faculty Council is still addressing the fallout from the Wainstein report.

“We have developed multiple mechanisms for faculty feedback as we’ve reiterated our commitment to academic integrity and teaching our students,” he said.

Crisp said he sees more good than bad in the University.

“For everything we might note that didn’t go right around here, there’s literally 100 of these stories and things that did go right,” Crisp said.

Folt gave an update on the University’s response to the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges. She said UNC made the intentional decision to go back and repeat answers to questions they had already provided answers to in previous reports and inquiries.

“We weren’t just going to paperclip those together and turn in that report,” she said. “We decided we, too, would take it seriously from the start — start over, do every single question, where it had similar material we would make that clear, but we would also add new sections every time we could.”

university@dailytarheel.com