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This article reports on a U.K. research study encompassing two surveys which used evidence-based scales of awareness, confidence to intervene, and intervention opportunities and action regarding sexual and domestic abuse on campus. They were sent to all first-year incoming undergraduates (> n = 7,000) at one post-1992 U.K. university and received n = 1,604 responses. The study finds that survey respondents demonstrated low awareness of sexual and domestic abuse as a problem on campus. In the analysis of Survey 2, respondents were divided into three groups, those receiving active intervention, passive intervention, and no intervention from a university social norms marketing campaign challenging abuse on campus. The study drives the field forward by considering how confidence to act mediates the relationship between awareness and positive action. It finds associations between active intervention and raised awareness that is not noted in passive or no intervention. Active intervention potentially brings together the mediating variable of confidence where awareness + confidence = positive action. This article makes recommendations for first-year incoming undergraduates to receive awareness raising information about sexual and domestic abuse, prior to coming to university. Universities may also consider working with schools to counter a lack of awareness, which may emanate from normalization discourses learnt prior to coming to university and perpetuated once there. Managing low awareness of sexual and domestic abuse should be a priority of bystander programs and some form of active intervention is potentially beneficial as early as possible in university student journeys.

Using policy frameworks and author expertise to identify relevant literature, four academics and two student-activist-authors, critically review literature upon student activist responses to sexual violence on campus. We conclude, student activism is pivotal to campus cultural change. In the UK, we review how student activism challenges outdated policy; in the US, how this has elevated the issue to national policy agendas. We apply theoretical frameworks of policy windows, policy entrepreneurs, campus readiness models and embodied intersectional citizenship. This article recommends universities work collaboratively with student activists, rather than viewing collaboration as a reputational risk. Further, we recommend developing Campus Community Readiness Models to include measures of collaboration. We contend, student activism can incur costs. Connecting activists online may help manage the transience of student activism. Collaboration and connection with and between student activists may represent a cultural shift toward sustainability stages of readiness characterised by community ownership.

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Mature female learners activating agency after completion of an education foundation degree: professional progression and the teacher shortage crisis', Research Papers in Education.