Appendix D

Workshop Case Studies

This appendix comprises six “case studies” that were sent to participants prior to the workshop. Each case study contains a 2–5-page description of an actual program, policy, or practice currently being carried out at an institution. This information comes from members of the Action Collaborative on Preventing Sexual Harassment in Higher Education (see Chapter 1); they submit these “Descriptions of Work” annually, which are then made public by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.¹ For the purposes of this workshop and proceedings, these descriptions have been lightly edited for clarity.

The Action Collaborative created a rubric to help organizations identify areas of work that are consistent with the findings and recommendations of Sexual Harassment of Women (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2018). The rubric comprises 28 activities in four categories: prevention, response, remediation, and evaluation.

To facilitate the sharing of actions taken, potential innovative ideas, and research on the effectiveness of actions, in the summer of 2020, Action Collaborative members were asked to provide at least one and up to five descriptions of their most significant, innovative efforts—either in the planning stages or being implemented—that are consistent with the report’s

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¹ Available: www.nationalacademies.org/sexual-harassment-collaborative-repository.

findings and recommendations and are new for either the organization or higher education overall.

At the workshop, these case studies were incorporated into presentations and used by breakout groups so that participants could consider whether and how they could be evaluated. Each participant was asked to read one case study, and they were welcomed to read more than one.

The purpose of using these case studies was not to judge them on their merit or likelihood for success; rather, the purpose was to help participants consider how actual prevention efforts might be evaluated for effectiveness.

This Action Applies to Three Rubric Items in the Remediation Category: preventing retaliation, reintegration strategies and programs, and other efforts to remediate the harm of sexual harassment and/or support those that experience sexual harassment.

Description of Work

Several high-profile instances of sexual violence/sexual harassment (SVSH) at our institution have involved interactions between faculty and graduate students. More broadly, as recognized in the report of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM, 2018) and other documents, several characteristics of these relationships (male-dominated in some disciplines; hierarchical and dependent relationships between faculty members and graduate students; isolating environments) create higher levels of risk for sexual harassment. And because of the dependence of graduate students on faculty mentors for different types of support, guidance, and promotion in the discipline, the disruption for a student associated with both the reporting of SVSH and the investigation and outcome of a report can be great.

The Beyond Compliance initiative at University of California, Santa Cruz, which was formed in 2016, seeks to define concrete mechanisms that administrators and faculty can adopt, above and beyond what is required by law or policy, to address SVSH on campus. The committee is co-chaired by a senior faculty member and a senior administrator, and it includes faculty members, graduate students, and key staff who are working to address SVSH and its consequences. The committee recognized the cascading impacts of SVSH on graduate students and decided to assemble a quick guide on best practices to remediate these impacts.

The guide considers a range of potential negative consequences for a graduate student who has experienced and reported SVSH. These include loss of the individual’s advisor, classroom professor, committee member, or letter writer; financial impacts due to loss of teaching-assistant or research-assistant support, as well as health insurance if the student takes a leave, slowed academic progress, challenges meeting residency requirements if the student moves away from campus to access support, and scenarios around journal submissions and grant proposals. For each potential impact, the guide identifies a point person or persons and any units with ultimate responsibility for ensuring that the issue is addressed, from the chair or director of graduate studies in the department, to the divisional dean, to the dean of graduate studies, to the campus provost/vice chancellor. The guide also identifies the office to which graduate students should report different types of conduct violations. Finally, for each type of impact, the guide suggests the types of remediation the point person(s)/unit should consider and who they might consult in moving forward with remediation. Below is an example of one of the entries on the spreadsheet.

Next steps: The guide was finalized in the middle of the 2019–2020 academic year and sent to the Division of Graduate Studies for comment. Due to a confluence of high-profile events (a wildcat graduate student strike beginning in November, the global coronavirus pandemic, campus upset and action around the killing of George Floyd), the Graduate Division has not yet responded to Beyond Compliance. We will request comments by early fall 2020. Following this review, we will send the guide to the Academic Senate for its input (certainly to the Committee on Affirmative Action and Diversity and the Graduate Council, and perhaps the Committee on Research). When Senate review is complete, the document will be finalized and shared with all units that bear responsibility for remediating impacts on graduate students, as well as with the Graduate Student Union.

Website for further information (if applicable):
Point of Contact Name: Paul Koch
Email Address for Point of Contact: plkoch@ucsc.edu

This Action Applies to One Rubric Item in the Response Category: improved communication and increased transparency.

Description of Work

Washington State Engrossed House Bill 2327 went into effect June 11, 2020. University of Washington (UW) staff, faculty, and other academic personnel, and community members provided input on the bill and testified in front of legislative committees in support of the bill. The law addresses many of the priorities outlined in the 2018 report of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. For example, the bill requires institutions of higher education in the state of Washington to share findings of harassment during reference checks, to ban the use of nondisclosure agreements, and to share publicly the results of any climate surveys. The state law, as described below, is specifically in response to harassment of students by employees; however, UW is expanding our procedures and compliance to include harassment of students and employees. Further information about the law follows.

Investigations and records: While UW had already made a commitment to completing investigations, the law now requires that unless a victim requests otherwise, a postsecondary institution will complete investigations of alleged sexual misconduct regardless of whether the employee voluntarily or involuntarily leaves employment with the institution. Written findings of completed investigations are required, and substantiated findings against an employee will be included in the employee’s personnel file. If, at the end of an investigation, allegations have not been substantiated, information about the allegations may be expunged.

Declaration of applicants: Prior to an offer of employment, applicants are required to sign a statement declaring whether they have ever been found responsible for any sexual misconduct at their current or a

prior place of employment and, if so, an explanation of what happened. The declaration also requires the applicant to indicate if an investigation is currently under way and to authorize current and past employers to disclose substantiated misconduct or current investigations. If applicants do not sign this statement, institutions cannot hire them.

Required reference checks: Prior to hiring an applicant, colleges and universities must request from any postsecondary institutions at which the applicant currently works or has worked any records about any substantiated findings of sexual misconduct. If information obtained regarding an applicant indicates any issue of concern, UW will take appropriate next steps.

The law also requires all postsecondary institutions to respond to reference checks from other postsecondary educational institutions by disclosing any substantiated findings of sexual misconduct and to provide information (documents, records, etc.) about any substantiated findings of sexual misconduct to any employer inquiring about one of their applicants regardless of whether such information is specifically requested. In order to comply with this section of the law, each institution must establish procedures to provide information about substantiated findings of sexual misconduct when another institution requests any such findings and ensure that those procedures will not disclose identifying information about a complainant or witnesses.

Ban nondisclosure agreements: The law states that settlement agreements may not include provisions prohibiting employees, institutions, survivors, or others from disclosing information that an employee is or was the subject of an investigation about sexual misconduct or of an investigation that yielded findings of sexual misconduct. Settlement agreements may include provisions allowing nondisclosure of identifying information about complainants or witnesses. Identifying information of complainant/ witnesses also is not subject to disclosure through public records requests.

Share results of climate assessments: When a climate assessment is conducted, postsecondary institutions need to share with the governor and appropriate legislative committees summaries of any climate assessment designed to gauge prevalence of sexual misconduct. In addition, institutions must include a description of efforts to reach out to and obtain information from traditionally marginalized students or those who disproportionately experience impacts of systemic oppression based on protected categories (e.g., race, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, and disability), along with information about how the results

of the assessment were used to design or improve policies, programs, and resources for the campus community.

This Washington state law went into effect in June 2020 with an October 1, 2020, compliance date for applicant declaration, a July 1, 2021, compliance date for the reference check requirement, and a December 2023 date for the sharing of any climate assessment information. UW is currently working to establish procedures within Human Resources and the Office of Academic Personnel that includes, among other things, centralizing records that contain findings and ensuring that they can be shared in compliance with state law.

Website for further information (if applicable):
http://lawfilesext.leg.wa.gov/biennium/2019-20/Pdf/Bills/Session%20Laws/House/2327-S.SL.pdf?q=20200416122655
Point of Contact Name: Valery Richardson
Email Address for Point of Contact: valeryr@uw.edu

This Action Applies to One Rubric Item in the Remediation Category: Reducing power differentials

Description of Work

The Problem: Admission to Graduate School to Work with a Specific Advisor

Graduate programs in biological/biomedical sciences may use any of three distinct types of admission processes. The most common is for several programs to band together and offer admission through an umbrella program, in which accepted students share a common first-year curriculum, meet several potential advisors from many graduate programs, and then join an advisor’s lab within a graduate program. Vanderbilt has two such umbrella programs, the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program (IGP) and the Quantitative and Chemical Biology Program (QBP) and all of Vanderbilt’s biomedical graduate programs participate.

In a second route, a graduate program may accept students into its specific program, in which students similarly can meet with several potential advisors and choose one. Vanderbilt’s Biological Sciences Department and Graduate Program in Neuroscience utilize this model, as well as the umbrella programs.

The third process is for a student to apply to a graduate program to work with one specific advisor, chosen in advance of applying. This is a direct-admit process. Sometimes the student and advisor have worked together previously, and sometimes they are unknown to each other. Direct-admit students may have less information for choosing an advisor, and they have less power to change labs if problems arise. Eight of the biomedical graduate programs at Vanderbilt offer students a direct-admit path

to entry, and one of these is the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology (CDB).

In 2019, CDB appointed a new director of graduate studies (DGS), who was also independently appointed by the provost to serve as a co-delegate to the Action Collaborative. The new DGS observed that direct-admit students seemed to have a more difficult path in graduate school than other students, with more advisor-student conflict and increased rates of leaving the Ph.D. program before graduation.

Structural differences in the direct-admit experience in CDB before the policy changes:

• Admission: Umbrella students are interviewed by four faculty members and reviewed by an admissions committee before being accepted. In contrast, direct-admit students were vetted by the prospective advisor without a standard framework.
• First-year funding: Students who enter through umbrella programs have their first year paid by university funds; they switch to advisor-based funding after they choose a lab. Direct-admit students were funded by their advisor from the first day in the program.
• Rotations: Students who enter through umbrella programs are required to do four rotations, in which they “try out” working in four different labs for a period of about 2 months in each lab, with the goal of identifying a thesis laboratory. These students experience a variety of mentoring styles, get a sense of cultural norms, and develop a professional network. In contrast, direct-admit students work with the same advisor’s lab from the beginning.
• Social experience: Students who enter through umbrella programs have a class identity and usually form strong bonds with classmates, forged in part in mentoring groups, which are a required part of their programs. In contrast, direct-admit students are more isolated and often know only people in their own lab. They are not required to participate in the mentoring groups because of the attention given in these groups to identifying a thesis laboratory.
• Switching labs: If a student requests, the umbrella program will pay for a student to undertake more rotations to find a new lab if problems arise. Further, students who enter through umbrella programs can enlist the help of the umbrella program faculty advisors and former rotation advisors in identifying a new lab. In contrast,

• the direct-admit students have few human resources, no access to funded rotations, and do not carry the official stamp of acceptance of the umbrella program.

Report of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine on sexual harassment of women—Analysis and relevant recommendations:

The report’s Recommendation 5 is to diffuse the hierarchical and dependent relationship between trainees and faculty. Direct-admit students are particularly dependent on their advisor because of the complete dependence on the advisor’s funding, their reduced professional network, and their decreased potential to change labs. Specifically, the report recommends mentoring networks and departmental funding.

The process of shaping a new policy:

1. Information was collected (May 2020) on all CDB direct-admit students for the last 11 years.
   1. Direct-admit students accounted for approximately 10% of doctoral students during this time.
   2. 40% of direct-admit students were foreign nationals. Because of visa stipulations that they must leave the United States if they leave graduate school, foreign nationals would be a uniquely vulnerable group. Further, they have fewer social supports in this country.
   3. 30% of direct-admit students had worked with their advisor before admission to graduate school as an undergraduate, a summer intern, or an employee. These students were very successful and had few problems.
   4. Direct-admit students were more likely than umbrella students to leave graduate school without a Ph.D. or to have significant academic problems. (We are not reporting these percentages because of the small number of students involved.)
   5. Anecdotally, it was frequently observed that direct-admit students did not know about the existence of the umbrella programs; or they did not realize that by choosing a direct-admit pathway their options were limited compared with their peers.
2. The other 10 biomedical graduate programs at Vanderbilt were queried by email about whether they had direct-admit programs

2. and how they managed them: “Will your program accept students to work directly with one faculty member who is entirely responsible for their finances?” Eight programs used the direct-admit path at varying frequencies and with various admissions requirements. The DGS discussed with the leaders of these programs their experiences with direct-admit programs (June 2020). Several focused on the success of students who had worked in the lab prior to matriculation.
3. The DGS and the CDB department chair met to discuss the problem and outline potential solutions, including departmental funding.
4. The DGS convened a meeting of the CDB Graduate Education Committee, composed of six CDB faculty (at that time. three assistant professors and three full professors) to brainstorm and evaluate solutions.
5. The Graduate Education Committee negotiated and compromised over email for several weeks, arriving at a new set of policies with unanimous support.
6. The committee recommended these policies to the full faculty, who voted overwhelming in favor (August 2020). The full policy can be found here: https://medschool.vanderbilt.edu/cdb/admission-to-cdbgraduate-program.

Why the direct-admit path was reformed rather than abolished:

Although the DGS originally suggested eliminating the direct-admit program entirely, the Graduate Education Committee did not support this approach for the following reasons.

1. Many direct-admit students with prior experience in the lab were spectacularly successful and clearly understood the environment they were joining.
2. The high proportion of foreign nationals was viewed as a benefit. Because of issues with funding international students, the IGP and QCB umbrella programs admit a limited number of foreign nationals in each class. Thus, abolishing the direct-admit path in CDB would reduce access for international students to an Ameri

2. can education, reduce access of the labs to highly talented students, and reduce CDB’s multicultural diversity.
3. Some faculty in CDB rely on direct-admit graduate students for their labs. Abolishing this route of admission would disproportionately affect them and likely interfere with their research programs.

Key elements of the new policy:
Policies were put in place to promote these goals:

1. To preserve the student’s choices. Because a student spends about 6 years in a lab with one advisor, they should know what they are signing up for.
   1. Students must apply to a Vanderbilt umbrella program in order to be considered for direct-admission to a lab at CDB. Only application, not admission, is required. By applying to the umbrella programs, students will become aware of their benefits and may choose that route of entry if available. Umbrella programs are the preferred route for graduate school, as they offer students the most choices and resources.
   2. Students expressing interest in the direct-admit program will be advised about the differences between it and the umbrella programs by the DGS.
   3. Students are expected to work in an advisor’s lab before applying to that lab through the direct-admit program. If they have not, they must explain why this is not possible in their application materials.
   4. Mentors must send their Mentoring Compact (a document outlining the responsibilities of the mentor and student) to the student before an offer of admission can be extended.
   5. If a student wants to change labs, and if this decision is supported by the pre-candidacy committee (see below), the department will fund the student for 12 weeks, which is sufficient time to do two rotations.
2. To increase the professional and social network of the student.
   1. A pre-candidacy committee will work with the student from the first week of the first year until a thesis committee is formed. The committee is charged with overseeing the student’s intellectual growth, class performance, lab productivity, and social adjustment to graduate school.

2. 2. A student-advisory group will be assigned to the student on arrival to campus, composed of three students with various overlapping interests, to provide a social network for the student.
   3. Direct-admit students will participate in mentoring groups with the umbrella students.
3. To maintain admissions standards.
   1. The application will be reviewed by the CDB Graduate Education Committee rather than just by the prospective mentor. Because candidates will have applied to an umbrella program, feedback from that admissions program can be taken into consideration by the committee. The ultimate admissions decision will be made by the committee rather than just by the DGS. This will make it easier for a student to change labs if needed.

Future evaluation metrics:

There are three metrics by which to measure success of the policy.

The first and most important is the experience of the direct-admit graduate students for the next 6 years, which is approximately one graduate-student generation. Because the numbers are expected to be small, this measure will be qualitative, noting their connectedness, levels of conflict with their advisor, academic success and professional productivity, and retention to completion of a Ph.D.

The second is to measure how many direct-admit graduate students have previously worked with their advisor prior to arriving. An increase in this percentage will be considered a success of the policies.

The third measure is the overall number of direct-admit graduate students. A decrease in their number will be considered a success of the policies.

Website for further information (if applicable):
https://medschool.vanderbilt.edu/cdb/admission-to-cdb-graduate-program
Point of Contact Name: Andrea Page-McCaw
Email Address for Point of Contact: andrea.page-mccaw@vanderbilt.edu

This Action Applies to One Rubric Item in the Prevention Category: civility or respect promotion programs.

Description of Work

In July 2018 Argonne National Laboratory established a set of core values as the foundation of the laboratory’s efforts to help create and sustain a safe, welcoming, diverse, and inclusive environment that enables all members of the Argonne community to perform their best work.

To maintain awareness of Argonne’s Core Values of Impact, Safety, Respect, Integrity, and Teamwork, as well as to highlight positive behaviors related to each value and promote action, Argonne created an employee engagement program called Core Values Shout-Outs. The program encourages employees to recognize colleagues for demonstrating the core values through their behaviors. This aligns with recommendations in the 2018 report of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine that anti-harassment efforts be combined with civility or respect promotion programs as a mechanism for highlighting behaviors that faculty, staff, and students should engage in rather than focusing only on negative behaviors.

The Core Values Shout-Outs program kicked off on July 31, 2019, in conjunction with the unveiling of a set of most valued behaviors for each core value. The Shout-Outs program was created as a simple way for employees to learn about and recognize valuable behaviors and to reinforce the shared accountability of each member of the Argonne community for creating a safe, welcoming, diverse, and inclusive work environment.

To give a colleague a shout-out, employees were asked to submit a simple online form with the recipient’s name, the core value they exemplified, and a one- or two-sentence description of the positive behavior they modeled. Awardees and their supervisors automatically received an email notification. The recipients then received a button for that value. Information from the shout-outs submissions was collected in a database that was shared with the laboratory’s Core Values Working Group and with laboratory leadership.

Thanks to the simplicity of giving a shout-out and the immediacy of the recognition, the Shout-Outs program was embraced wholeheartedly by employees at all levels of the laboratory. Within weeks, it became common to see employees proudly displaying the buttons they had earned on their lanyards. The campaign increased the visibility of Argonne’s core values and positive behaviors not only through buttons on lanyards, but also through an internal communications promotion of the program, which included digital posters, stories in the daily email employee newsletter, and information on the employee intranet. Volunteer core values ambassadors in every division at the laboratory not only helped to facilitate the program, but also provided increased visibility and promotion.

Originally set to run from July 31 through December 31, 2019, the program was extended to March 5, 2020, due to its popularity and the value laboratory leadership saw in it as a tool for recognition and encouragement of positive behavior. At a lab-wide, all hands meeting on November 14, 2019, Argonne director Paul Kearns challenged employees to achieve 3,000 shout-outs by the end of the program.

The laboratory community rose to the challenge, and the program ended March 5, 2020, with more than 3,400 shout-outs given. An analysis of the data collected through the program provided further insights that were shared at a lab wide all-hands meeting on May 28, 2020, through a light-hearted video featuring employees from across the laboratory. This included learning that:

• Every division across the lab gave and received shout-outs.
• The core value recognized the most was teamwork.
• More than 85% of shout-outs received were given peer to peer rather than by supervisor to staff.

Data collected from the Shout-Outs program also was used to create case studies for discussion during training offered to all employees on learning how to identify and address situations and behaviors that are not consistent with the lab’s core values. This training will be offered through August 2020.

Further evaluation of the core values and the Shout-Outs program was sought in a pulse employee climate survey conducted over 3 weeks in June of 2020. Specifically, respondents were asked about activities that have positively influenced their thinking or behavior including the laboratory’s

focus on Core Values efforts and programs such as the Shout-Outs. Survey results are expected in late summer 2020.

As a majority of the laboratory’s employees moved to teleworking in March 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, laboratory leadership identified a need to keep the core values visible to employees working remotely. Plans were developed to bring the Core Values Shout-Outs back but in a completely digital format.

Shout-Outs 2.0, the digital version, was introduced at a lab-wide all-hands meeting on May 28, 2020, to help emphasize the importance of employees staying connected while working apart. Through the laboratory human resources application Workday, employees still submit shout-outs. Instead of a physical button, a digital button appears in the recipient’s Workday account. Both recipients and their supervisors receive notification of the shout-out.

Shortly after the Shout-Outs 2.0 roll out, the information from the more than 3,400 shout-outs in the previous campaign was merged with the new, digital version. Now, employees can view all the shout-outs they’ve earned in one place in Workday. Work is currently under way to create further online visibility for each employee’s shout-outs. In fall of 2020, shout-outs will be displayed on employees’ individual intranet homepages, in their online profiles, and in the laboratory’s online directory.

What began as a means to create awareness of the laboratory’s core values and enlist employee participation in putting the values into action has evolved into a continued form of recognition and a constant, visible reminder of what Argonne values as a community. This further solidifies the core values as the foundation of the laboratory’s efforts to achieve its goals of expanding Argonne’s leadership in science and technology, achieving operational excellence, and building and sustaining a world-class community of talent.

Website for further information (if applicable): https://www.anl.gov/our-core-values
Point of Contact Name: Megan Clifford
Email Address for Point of Contact: mclifford@anl.gov

This Action Applies to Five Rubric Items, Four in the Prevention Category and One in the Response Category: civility or respect promotion programs, leadership education and skill development, bystander intervention programs, audience-specific anti-sexual harassment education, and addressing gender harassment and other bad behaviors.

Description of Work

1. The purpose and goals of what you did or what you are doing, and how you did it

   Lab-based workshops were developed as an initiative to reach graduate students and postdocs and train them about issues and resources related to gender bias and sexual harassment. The lab workshops were based on prevention research that shows that conducting workshops with intact groups is an effective approach for shifting culture and building skills. The lab serves as an important unit of community within the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) environment, and the lab workshops provide an opportunity for MIT resources to connect with the lab and help reestablish norms. It’s important to note that the offices that have previously led this initiative (the Institute Discrimination and Harassment Response Office [IDHR] and Violence Prevention and Response [VPR]) approached this work at the department-level instead of by request from individual labs to amplify the impact of a department initiative. These offices would partner with the students and department leadership, conduct a faculty demo during a regular faculty meeting, and then the department chair would put it to a vote (once the presenters left) so that this could be a faculty-driven initiative with the appropriate buy-in and engagement. Additionally, most department heads would require the workshop to be completed in a certain time frame by all faculty in the department.

2. How it is consistent with the findings and recommendations of the 2018 Report of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (as outlined in the rubric)

   MIT partners with departments to develop a tailored, 2-hour in-person workshop that is delivered by trained facilitators to each lab cohort, “Promoting a Professional and Inclusive Lab Culture.” Attendance at each workshop includes all students, postdocs, and the principal investigator (PI). Typically, each PI in the department is required to host a workshop at some point during a designated semester. The workshop content is created using focus group feedback from students and staff about climate issues within the department and leverages any school/department level climate data, and national field data (if available). Content includes:

   • The impact of unintentional harms/micro-aggressions at an individual, community, and institutional level.
   • Reporting options, policies, and resources on campus.
   • Acknowledging the role each person has in contributing to the culture of the group which ties into Rubric Item 2 [civility or respect promotion programs] in promoting civility and respect.
   • Understanding power dynamics and different ways of conceptualizing power which ties into Rubric Item 3 [leadership education and skill development] by encouraging a broader sense of power beyond positional authority. This is especially important to highlight to graduate students the ways in which they have influence in the community.
   • Bystander intervention skills to recognize and address gender-based harassment and other forms of discrimination which ties into Rubric Item 4 [bystander intervention programs, specific to higher education or field, and/or audience] by providing participants with different ways of intervening beyond “direct” intervention in the moment.
   • A section on sexual harassment/gender harassment examples and policies which ties into Rubric Item 5 [audience-specific anti-sexual harassment education] with specific focus on

2. • the difference between ambient harassment and targeted harassment.
   • Activities to create more inclusive and welcoming lab environments for everybody, with special attention to the role of faculty members and research staff in setting the tone and holding people accountable, which ties into Rubric Item 16 [addressing gender harassment and other bad behaviors] by concluding the workshop with an activity that asks labs to come up with the first piece of their values/expectations statement for the lab.
3. The current status of the work (in progress of finalizing plan/ action, currently being implemented, or implemented)

   These workshops are currently being implemented. They have been rolled out successfully in the chemistry department (2018), chemical engineering department (2019), and the Media Lab (spring 2020); we were in the process of working with the mechanical engineering department when COVID-19 disrupted our progress as we went remote on March 16, 2020. We have just tested a virtual version of the workshop with success and are working to develop a way to consistently facilitate the workshops virtually. There are many other departments that are interested in rolling out this workshop, and we are currently working on ways to meet the demand (hiring additional staff, exploring the effectiveness of virtual workshops, etc.).

4. How this work is either (new or uncommon for higher education)

   Though the workshop has been continually updated, the actual concept of the workshop was developed pre-2019. The idea of an entire department committing each lab to this workshop is uncommon for higher education, and we think has contributed to its success because it ensures an education dosage for the entire community that is meaningful, interactive, tailored, and occurring during the same time period.

5. Plans to evaluate the work and/or evaluation results or impact of work

   We have been regularly evaluating the workshops. Recently, for the Media Lab, we shifted from a more satisfaction-oriented evaluation to a learning outcomes-based evaluation. Additionally, we implemented a 6-month post-test for the chemical engineering department and are in the process of doing so for the Media Lab as well. This post-test evaluation helps us determine the long-term impact of the training.

   Two graduate students in the chemical engineering department helped us submit for publication an overview of the workshop and participant data to the American Society for Engineering Education conference.

6. How you involved or are involving stakeholders in the plans and/or work

   We identify three main stakeholders in this initiative: graduate students, faculty of the department, and the chair of the department.

   • Graduate students are often the reason we receive a departmental request, and they are invaluable in helping us customize examples, provide feedback on the flow of the workshop, and share any student-level data they’ve collected about the graduate student experience in the department.
   • Faculty are important stakeholders because this workshop is done at the lab level and a faculty member’s investment and engagement before during and after the workshop impacts the climate and culture of the lab group. One of the ways we specifically engage faculty is by running through the workshop in a faculty meeting with them to incorporate their feedback and create buy-in about the workshop content.
   • Lastly, the department chair is a vital stakeholder in our workshop initiative because they have the ability to communicate to the entire department why it is worth taking time out of our busy schedules to do this and connect it to other work happening at the departmental level to address climate, inclu

6. • sion, and belonging. As mentioned earlier, the chair also gives faculty an opportunity to vote on the initiative to ensure it is faculty driven. We have had some department chairs require it and others strongly encourage it. Participation is higher when it is mandated.
7. What you envision next steps for this work to be

   Our next steps include working to continually increase our bandwidth to provide workshops for more departments at more regular intervals. One of the options we hope to look into further is a train-the-trainer model of presenting this workshop. Additionally, as time has gone on, labs that took the training in 2018–2019 have asked if there is a second iteration of the workshop. Though we do not have anything formally developed, spending time to think about how new material and content could build on the foundational workshop is another next step.

   Lastly, especially in this last academic year, we’ve received more requests for the content of the workshop to be intersectional in its conceptualization and to not only talk about gender-based harassment but also other forms of micro-aggressions, discrimination, and biased behavior on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, and other categories of identity. Every time we’ve updated the content we’ve striven to approach the examples and content in a more intersectional way.

8. Link to more information about the effort and/or contact info

Website for further information (if applicable):
Point of Contact Name: Sarah Rankin or Bianca Kaushal
Email Address for Point of Contact: srankin@mit.edu; bkaushal@mit.edu

This Action Applies to Seven Rubric Items, Five in the Prevention Category and Two in the Response Category: Leadership education and skill development, bystander intervention programs (specific to higher education or field, and/or audience), audience-specific anti-sexual harassment education, ally or ambassador programs, prevention program or toolkits, trauma-informed response and education programs, and addressing gender harassment and other bad behaviors.

Description of Work: We R Here Staff and Faculty Training Initiative

A full-time staff and faculty training coordinator, a position and conceptualization of the work entirely new to Rutgers, was hired at Rutgers in November of 2019 to launch the new We R Here Staff and Faculty Training Initiative across all Rutgers campuses. A core, in-person, anti-sexual harassment training was created. This training, developed with principles of trauma-informed bystander intervention strategies, provides skills to recognize, correct, and address sexual harassment (with a focus on gender-based harassment), support impacted students and colleagues, and effectively use university policies for action and to create positive culture shift.

This interactive training has been tailored for delivery at Rutgers’ New Jersey School of Medicine for 700 staff and faculty and will be customized for other university ecosystems accordingly. The We R Here Faculty and Staff Training Initiative will also include the development of a faculty ambassador train-the-trainer program and a comprehensive toolkit with specific, actionable items of change for departments, schools, and academic leaders to adopt to ensure sustainable change.

The goals of the Staff and Faculty Training Initiative are to (1) clearly define sexual and gender-based harassment, (2) discuss how sexual harassment manifests in each specific university environment, (3) provide concrete skills to interrupt sexual harassment in the work place using trauma-informed bystander intervention strategies, and (4) explore concrete

action steps to encourage behavior change and to sustainably prevent sexual harassment at Rutgers.

This work aligns with the recommendations of the study Sexual Harassment of Women: Climate, Culture, and Consequences in Academic Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM, 2018), particularly in the areas of prevention, leadership education and skill development, bystander intervention programs, audience-specific anti-sexual harassment programs, ally and ambassador programs, and prevention toolkits.

As mentioned in the report, the faculty and staff trainings have been designed not to change beliefs but instead to “clearly communicate behavioral expectations” and to provide individuals with the tools to effectively identify, intervene, and prevent sexual harassment both in the workplace and among students. Rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, trainings are specifically tailored to each audience and ecosystem, and are skills-based, interactive, and trauma informed.

Recognizing that training alone cannot bring about lasting culture change, the faculty and staff training coordinator will also create a comprehensive toolkit, which will include best practices for onboarding, sample informal policies and behavioral change measures, trauma-informed resources, sample syllabus statements, and classroom exercises to encourage discussion, social media templates, and departmental and self-assessment tools. A faculty ambassador component is also being developed. In line with the report’s findings that women of color are particularly vulnerable to sexual harassment, as well as less likely to report it, each training and intervention has been designed incorporating principles of intersectionality and with an anti-racist, anti-oppressive lens.

This work is currently in progress and continues. Several of the core trainings have been researched, designed, and delivered via WebEx, and outreach to faculty and staff is ongoing. The training coordinator will offer a training series in the fall of 2020 remotely, open to all faculty and staff, that focuses on supporting colleagues and staff remotely during COVID, with a particular focus on Black and other people of color colleagues and students who are disproportionally impacted by the pandemic and systemic racism at large. The series will also feature prominent anti-racist, anti-sexual assault advocate Wagatwe Wanjuki who will focus specifically on supporting Black students remotely.

In addition to offering WebEx and limited in-person trainings for faculty and staff in the coming year, the training coordinator will focus on

research, development, and dissemination of the staff and faculty toolkit as well as launching the ambassador program.

It is important to note that certain revisions or changes to the work have taken place, a result of adapting to a remote environment due to COVID-19. The training coordinator worked during March and April (2019) to migrate all trainings to an online platform, although she will still offer limited in-person training to faculty and staff who remain on the ground (for instance, essential medical personnel). Also due to COVID transitions and stressors, demand for training has decreased, but the training coordinator continues to reach out to faculty and staff, including via virtual postcards with action steps and resources, and by offering more training options and making sure content is tailored to shifting needs. A tip sheet for responding to disclosures remotely during COVID-19 was also developed and posted on the university-wide resource site, coronavirus.rutgers. edu, as well as on the university’s sexual harassment prevention website, sexualharassment.rutgers.edu.

Assessment is an integral part of the program. Evaluations are provided to each participant after every training, and an online form has been created for WebEx programs. These evaluations will be used to gather feedback and be analyzed for continuous improvement, to ensure that trainings align with Action Collaborative goals [see Chapter 1]. There will also be questions about training and engagement on the upcoming university-wide faculty, student, and staff climate survey, scheduled to be put into the field during the fall of 2021. Interventions and training will be modified accordingly, in response to assessment results.

With regard to involvement of stakeholders in the work, this position itself was developed specifically to engage multiple stakeholders. The training coordinator spends 50% of her time with university human resources, in an effort to streamline training efforts, engage more faculty and staff, and ensure that university policy is appropriately responsive to faculty, staff, and administrator needs around sexual harassment. The training coordinator also works with the leadership of the university’s representatives to the Action Collaborative representatives, the Rutgers Center on Violence Against Women, the university Title IX offices, and all violence prevention and victim assistance offices in order to coordinate training, share resources, and remain up to date on university services and policies.

With regard to next steps for the work, in addition to the creation of the toolkit and ambassador program, the next steps will be to continue to respond and adapt to the needs of faculty, staff, and administrators

during COVID, including bringing awareness to the fact that sexual and gender-based harassment do not disappear when colleagues and students are working remotely. Since harassment may take different forms and the responses and interventions need to be tailored accordingly, the training coordinator will continue to work to modify training content and offer flexible opportunities as needed. And since all of the aforementioned work is funded by an external grant that ends in August 2021, the training coordinator will continue to explore options for sustainability with university leadership.

Website for further information (if applicable):
Point of Contact Name: Kaylin Padovano, LMSW
Email Address for Point of Contact: kaylin@hr.rutgers.edu