Harassment

Harassment is unwanted physical, verbal or non-verbal conduct which may intentionally or unintentionally violate a person’s dignity or create an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment which interferes with an individual’s learning, working or social environment.

 

Harassment can be in the form of spoken or written words or abuse, offensive emails, tweets or comments on social networking sites, images and graffiti, physical gestures, facial expressions or jokes. If any of these are of a sexual nature, it is called sexual harassment. You don’t need to have previously objected to something for it to be unwanted.

 

 

Harassment creates an intimidating and hostile environment which has a negative impact on work and social life. By reporting incidents victims can access support. By sharing information about issues of harassment, the University may be able to prevent these incidents happening to somebody else. It may also help the Police understand the extent of anti-social behaviour in your local area so they can better respond to it.

 

 

You may wish to initially report to the University. You can do this via the links below:

• Share and Support provides options to report anonymously or to report and speak to an Adviser. An Adviser will listen to you in confidence and offer information, practical help and support. They can offer support to deal with the emotional effects of harassment and help you get support from other organisations.
• Wellbeing Services offers practical advice to more intensive support to help make your time here at Huddersfield run as smoothly as possible.
• The Student Handbook of regulations details how to make a formal complaint. Colleagues in the Students’ Union and Student Services are able to advise on this process and offer alternative routes to resolve matters such as mediation or conciliation.

• The Students’ Union provides free, independent, confidential and impartial advice to everyone on their rights and responsibilities.
• Citizens Advice provide free, independent, confidential and impartial advice to everyone on their rights and responsibilities.