Over 1500 students and staff are taking part in King’s consent campaign

King’s is leading the way with consent classes, with huge male and female attendance figures for a new movement aimed at fighting sexual harassment.

The collaborative campaign from King’s College London and KCLSU, ‘It Stops Here’, is bringing together the entire community to raise awareness about what sexual harassment is, and its impacts, as well as providing support for victims, the campaign uses events workshops and training to put their pledge into action.

Over 1500 staff and students have taken the pledge, including the Principal Ed Byrne, the KCLSU Officer team and over 21 student societies. The campaign video is being included at every induction, with student talks and 21 events and workshops have been run with over 800 attendees. In addition to this, frontline staff are receiving the best training from the Rape Crisis Centre and support and reporting guidance has been made clearer and more accessible. A motion has been passed in KCLSU for consent workshops to be a part of the mandatory Presidents and Treasurers Training.

The Tab spoke to Hana Riazuddin, Student Diversity & Inclusion Officer, about the ‘It Stops Now’ campaign.

Hana Riazuddin, Student Diversity & Inclusion Officer

She said: “Attendees were extremely diverse and included men and women, as well as diverse cultural and social backgrounds. This in part was largely due to the collaborative approach we took to run events and activities that raised awareness in accordance with the interests of different student groups and societies.

“We managed to deliver a handful of consent workshops but were working towards developing a more comprehensive, impactful workshop to support the campaign in a way that equipped students to challenge harassment.

“We are officially launching a workshop this September that the Students Union have designed with input from Rape Crisis and the NUS. These workshops aim to raise awareness and encourage students to take an active role in creating a safe and inclusive culture as well as offering approaches to challenge inappropriate behaviour and language safely. This will be delivered to societies, officers and student as well as departments that want to host workshops for their students.

“Over the next 12 months, we’ll be hosting more events, launching training and workshops to equip students and staff to challenge sexist and harassing behaviour, and continue to encourage survivors to report incidents and receive the support they need.  

“Whilst we’ve made a great start to launching the campaign, we’ve still got a long way to go. We will continue to measure the impact of our activities as we shift from raising awareness to the behavioural change phase of our work.”