The number of harassment complaints received by The University’s Advice Place has leapt by over 600 per cent in a year.

The number of harassment complaints received by the University’s Advice Place has leapt by over 600 per cent in a year.

At the University of Edinburgh, the Student's Association encourages students to approach the Advice Place with bullying-related problems.

In 2007-2008 the number of queries relating to harassment was second only to those regarding financial hardship funds.

At 1156, complaints about harassment rocketed compared to the previous year’s figure of 184, although the Advice Place could not identify how many could be specifically described as bullying.

The increasing demand for bullying support services encouraged the Anti-Bullying Network, a local non-profit organisation, to relaunch at the end of last year.

The network, originally set up by the University in 1999, focuses on providing support and training for tackling bullying in local schools, although it has also published advice for university students.

Last week’s NUS Student Experience survey found that seven per cent of students had been victims of bullying during higher education.

According to the NUS study, many cases go unreported to the institution in question. This was largely because the victims, who were predominantly female, were unsure who to talk to.

Another reason that the targets of bullying chose to stay silent was that many preferred to rely on their friends to help them cope with the problem rather than seeking institutional support.

The level of assistance varied greatly at different universities. In some institutions, 38 per cent of sufferers said they had benefited from support.

An equal number said that university intervention had not solved the problem, while 23 per cent claimed that their university had refused to intervene.

The report states: “Of those that had experienced bullying, the majority, 79 per cent, said that it was carried out by another student with 24 per cent saying it was carried out by a member of staff”.

Comments

Add New

Anonymous (86.156.206.xxx) 2008-12-08 16:12:02 Shocking. Reply 0   0

Write comment
Name:
Email:	do not notifynotify
Title:
Please input the anti-spam code that you can read in the image.

Powered by !JoomlaComment 3.26

3.26 Copyright (C) 2008 Compojoom.com / Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."