Universities have recently attracted significant public attention for all the wrong reasons. Current challenges include:

Sexual harassment and sexual misconduct

Racism

Microaggressions

Disparities in student recruitment, retention and attainment

A lack of diversity and representation of women and minorities in leadership. 

Inequitable power dynamics

Yet universities also represent the potential for positive change. Research shows that bystander approaches are most effective in organisations where group identities and culture are strong – like universities. Universities also offer the possibility to harness the benefits of multiple training methods. For example, training can be delivered to multiple levels of the organisation and reinforced through poster campaigns, public talks, web content and news features supporting the topic. Again, research shows that a whole system approach utilising multiple methods is the most effective at achieving community-level change.