COSHARE (Consent, Sexual Violence, Harassment, and Equality in Higher Education)

This programme will produce an all-island approach to consent, sexual violence and harassment (C-SVH) research and practice in Higher Education (HE). This addresses significant sources of risk and harm to HE staff and students. This problem is compounded by diverse, uncoordinated national responses. Although UK funding investment and policy development have accelerated, UK HE lacks comprehensive, shared strategies on prevalence measurement, evaluation, or common practices in awareness raising, education, and training. Crucially, minimal research has addressed the role and experiences of HE staff, reducing potential contribution to whole campus C-SVH approaches. Consequently, HE lacks the basis for engaging efficiently and effectively with national policy and funding, or from a position of knowledge. Moreover, the potential to reduce harms and become a societal model of good practice is unfulfilled. The Republic of Ireland (ROI) is an emerging model of integrated HE policy, research and practice with particular relevance to Northern Ireland (NI). The ROI partner is at the forefront of these developments. In this programme, NI and ROI partners seek to understand the experience, confidence, and capacity of staff to support students and their colleagues on relevant C-SVH actions. Highlighting research excellence, practical engagement, and sustainable culture change, this programme of work will explore how staff can be harnessed as cultural change agents through robust evaluation, and non/academic stakeholder engagement. Two work packages, which will proceed independently but work in parallel, will roll out North and South: 1.Building research capacity Develop and run a staff survey to assess C-SVH attitudes and experiences, including marginalised groups. 2.Conferring with academics and professionals to foster knowledge exchange a. Establish national and international C-SVH networks of researchers, support staff, student leaders, and external organisations to disseminate and share learning. b.Share research through public-facing community events (e.g., to colleges, schools' outreach, etc.). Objectives of the proposal 1.Understand the experience, confidence, and capacity of staff to support students and their colleagues on relevant C-SVH actions such as practical initiatives, engagement with policy, disclosure of SVH. 2.Assess underlying attitudes and cultural beliefs of a cross-section of staff on indicators such as gender, consent comprehension, rape myths, alcohol and drug use. 3.Assess and consolidate the needs of stakeholder groups that are critical to the implementation of an institutional culture change programme and contribute to network development. 4.To make recommendations and a model for organisational leadership to integrate C-SVH into strategy and processes at institutional level. Expected Outcomes: A central contribution is the transdisciplinary focus, seeking to bring together knowledge and expertise to interrogate how we understand staff perspective of C-SVH within the context of HE. The project aims to produce an all-island strategy to surveying staff about their experiences and perspectives on C-SVH in HE and will be proposed to policy makers as a standardised approach across the ROI and NI. The project network and dissemination activities offer a basis for engaging efficiently and effectively with national policy and funding from a position of knowledge, offering a staff-led approach to engaging with national policy priorities on C-SVH.