Secretary and Vice President for Student Life Kimberly Goff-Crews announced last Friday new resources that students can use to report and prevent discrimination and sexual misconduct.
In an email to the Yale community, Goff-Crews described the resources, including a new dean’s designees program, in which a representative from each school is appointed to be available to students regarding issues of discrimination and harassment.
According to Goff-Crews, her office developed the program in response to student interest in individualized support within their own schools in cases of discrimination and sexual misconduct.
“The program was developed in conjunction with the ongoing and long-term commitment of the University to provide resources for discrimination and harassment concerns,” Goff-Crews said. “Adding the additional resource of dean’s designees will mean that students have a better understanding of the resources and options available to them and feel supported at every level.”
The designees for Yale College are Camille Lizarribar, dean of student affairs, and Burgwell Howard, associate vice president of student life. Howard said designees at some of the smaller Yale-affiliated graduate and professional schools also function as Title IX coordinators at their respective schools. However, this is not true of either Howard or Lizarribar.
Designees are meant to serve as a general point of reference for students, but students should bring specific allegations of sexual misconduct or gender discrimination directly to the University’s Title IX coordinator, according to the newly-launched Sexual Misconduct Response & Prevention website.
Designees are meant to act as a liaison between students and pre-existing sources of support provided by the University, Howard said. For this reason, he explained, students should contact other University staff with concerns related to gender discrimination or sexual misconduct.
“Students know that they may reach out to staff across the University but also to have more localized folks within the undergraduate college, or within graduate and professional schools who can help people navigate the process and help students make choices about how they would like to proceed,” Howard said.
Goff-Crews also announced the Sexual Misconduct Response & Prevention website’s relaunch in her email. The website provides students with resources for emotional support, allows students to report incidents of harassment and contains detailed information on Yale’s sexual misconduct policies.
In addition to the Dean’s Designees initiative and the revamped Sexual Misconduct Response & Prevention Website, Goff-Crews also announced updates to the Bulldog Mobile app. Through the app, students will now be able to contact Yale police, staff at Sexual Harassment and Assault Response & Education Center, the Title IX Office and the Office for Equal Opportunities Programs.
The University reported 82 complaints of sexual misconduct between Jan. 1 and June 30 of this year.
Natalie Wright | natalie.wright.nw287@yale.edu
Correction, Oct. 17: This article and its headline have been updated to reflect that dean’s designees are primarily administrators rather than faculty and that they are primarily focussed on discrimination and harassment rather than sexual misconduct.