Report & Support

My name's Kirstie Farmer and I’m the Student Safeguarding and Equality Manager for the University.

Report and Support is an online tool that's available on My Napier. It's a tool for the university community to report any sort of inappropriate behaviour, so whether that's sexual violence and misconduct, hate crime based on race or homophobia for example, and any other sort of bullying and harassment. Behaviour can be reported through Report and Support.

The reason that we have it is because as a university we want to have a safe and supported way that people can report these sort of things, and so that we can monitor any sort of inappropriate types of behaviour as well. If a friend discloses something to you or you're aware of something that's happened and you can actually report on behalf of a friend – there is the option for you to do that.

You can either report to an advisor or you can report anonymously, whether you're reporting you for yourself or reporting on behalf of a friend. Once you've made a report, if you choose to report anonymously (which lots of people will do for good reason) the report will be logged, you will get some information that will tell you about where you can go for support around the incident or behaviour that you're reporting.

If you choose to report to an advisor, the report will be logged, you'll be asked to give a little bit of information about the incident you're reporting and then an advisor will get back in touch with you. You can choose how you want an advisor to get back to you. You can choose to leave an email address or you can leave a phone number and so the advisor will either email you to arrange a time to maybe have a chat with you or they will phone you up if you've given consent.

At Napier we have a team of around seven or eight people trained up to be Specialist Sexual Violence Misconduct Liaison Officers, or SVLMO you might also see it as, and these are people who are trained to advise you what your options are once you've made a report. They will talk you through what might happen if you report to the police for example, and they can also explain how you can report internally through our appeals, complaints and conduct manager and give you a bit of information about what to expect during those processes.

What they'll also do is give you information about different sources of support you can access, both within Edinburgh Napier—so that might be through our counselling and mental wellbeing services for example—or what other external supports are available in the community and that are available to you.

At Edinburgh Napier, we want it to be an inclusive environment where everybody can bring their true selves to the university, where people are supported to succeed and achieve their potential. As part of that we need to communicate a zero-tolerance approach to any sort of inappropriate behaviour and really encourage people to report in a safe and supported way. Report and Support facilitates that, and whether you're reporting anonymously or to an advisor, it helps us to set you up with the right kind of support for you.