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South East universities roll out programme to report harassment

South East universities roll out programme to report harassment

A new online tool will allow students to express themselves, according to IT Carlow's Students Union.

Speak Out is a new service in 18 higher education institutions that allows students and staff to report sexual harassment and discrimination.

Both IT Carlow and WIT have signed up for the programme.

Speaking to Beat News, Jack Hogan, ITCSU's Welfare and Equality Officer says it allows people to talk about how they're feeling while remaining anonymous;

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"Some students are actually not comfortable going to people about these problems, so at least if they're not going to the support services we have on campus like counselors or the students union, they're getting it out somehow so we can at least have the information to know if something is happening on campus so we can properly approach the problem and make sure it doesn't continue."

Students in IT Carlow and WIT will can also report other incidents such as hate crimes, bullying and stalking.

Hogan believes every higher education institute should have a service like Speak Out;

"Every higher institute needs a service like this because it's becoming more and more normal to speak out about these issues. So now that we have it I think it's absolutely fantastic that we can continue to do that and it's only going to get better as time goes on."

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