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Bias Incident Support and Advisory

Bias Prevention

SMSU’s initiatives and strategies to prevent discrimination, bias, and harassment within our campus community take several forms. All members of the campus community play an important part in building an inclusive community that is responsive to individual and group experiences. An emphasis on a community centric model helps to create a culture of care and belong for all.

Campus Engagement

Our focus has been to build campus community awareness of the role of the BISA team. As a result, community engagement projects have included developing programming responsive to the needs of the individual or individuals indicated in the bias incident reports submitted to the team.

Campus Community Education

Educating our campus community through high-impact trainings, speaking engagements or events as well as online, are part of our strategy to reduce instances of bias, discrimination, and harassment. Learning Connections, as a collaboration of the Human Resources Office and the Campus Diversity Officer, provided 12 in-person educational sessions that focused on topics of diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging as well as fostering a culture of care. We also provided Vector Solutions training modules for all campus employees that emphasized understanding our roles and responsibilities as they pertain to Title IX and the Clery Act, but also focused on understanding and managing bias.

Bias Incident Support and Advisory: Action Items

Community Awareness and Education

  • Intentional and impactful educational strategies regarding identifying, preventing, and reporting bias, harassment, and discrimination as well as informal and formal resolution options.
  • Continue to foster a culture of care and accountability in the campus community through identity-based programming, goals and action steps as they pertain to campus climate, and inclusive pedagogy strategies.

 Data Collection and Dissemination

  • Continue to monitor and track the submission of bias incident reports and work to align the incident report data with other data sets i.e. campus climate.
  • Use of data to inform prevention strategies and priorities specific areas of opportunity, for example student to student bias prevention efforts.
  • Assess the effectiveness of prevention and intervention strategies.

 Intervention and Response Strategies

  • Implement restorative practices and by-stander intervention strategies to support resolution and community well-being.
  • Continue to implement response strategies that emphasize impact over intent.

 Continuous Improvement

  • Continue to evaluate the BISA team protocol, guiding practices and principles to fully meet the needs of our changing campus community.
  • Provide transparency in the reporting and assessment practices utilized by the BISA team.

Report a Bias Incident

Last Modified: 2/4/25 9:53 AM | Website Feedback