Dear students,
On Monday, we received an open letter which has been shared with us by a number of societies who feel let down by our handling of the Freedom Society investigation.
We are proud of how you have come together to stand in solidarity against Islamophobia and in support of our Muslim students. Islamophobia has no place in Exeter, and we know the harm that incidents like this can cause within our community.
What we’ve reflected on and learned
To protect the confidentiality and integrity of the investigation process, we need to strike the right balance between privacy and transparency. Confidentiality is important to ensure we undertake a full and accurate investigation to prevent bias, collect truthful information and safeguard affected students. We understand that you want to know more for reassurance and to hold us accountable. Fairness and transparency are important to us, so we will share internal findings for the Guild, but we cannot share specifics relating to individuals.
We’ve identified that our processes around society risk management are not always clear, and that we need to support societies more to engage with training when they are conducting activities with a higher risk profile. It was not known by the organisers that the speaker was not a University of Exeter student, and therefore this event was not subject to our thorough external speaker processes which would have reduced risks surrounding a discussion on this topic. When our external speaker processes are followed, we are able to support societies to introduce measures to reduce risks such as briefing the speaker on what constitutes lawful and unlawful speech and enhanced intervention training to ensure societies have procedures in place to identify and intervene if there is hate speech.
We have supported societies to run 90+ speaker events this year already, working collaboratively on a weekly basis with at least 9 societies who regularly host external speakers on topics that attract strong debate. This event has highlighted several gaps in how we support societies to manage risks associated with their activities and action has already been taken to address this.
We’ve also identified that our staff need better guidance and training to enable them to examine society events that include student or internal debates or speeches. Our focus has been oriented towards external speakers, but the risks are far more broadly applicable, and our operating procedures aren’t helpful in identifying risks outside of the external speaker process.
We are working with our system developers and internal processes to enhance eligibility checks on society leadership positions now that we have students on the campus who are not members of the Guild – this change came about for University of Law students in September, and we had not realised that our system does not automatically update when a student is no longer a member.
As a result of this investigation, we are going to conduct a review of the intersection between the new free speech duties, our Code of Conduct, and the University Dignity and Respect policy to make sure we are doing everything we possibly can to live our value of being radically inclusive, and to ensure freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom from consequences. We will also review our risk management processes for societies, working specifically with the University on a targeted mandatory training offer for societies hosting external speakers or discussions on topics likely to be polarising. This will ensure that impact to the community is a key consideration in event planning and measures can be put in place to support societies, their members and the wider student community. This also helps us offer clarity on responsibilities of those hosting such sensitive events, and ensure they take all necessary steps, to prevent and where necessary intervene, to challenge hate speech.
Whilst we have been clear about the limitations of our powers when it comes to non-member complaints, complaints relating to the conduct of University of Law students can be made here. We have seen some general comments about society conduct and we want to reassure you that we have and will investigate every complaint that is reported to the Guild in line with our Complaints Policy.
As always, if you have experienced discrimination or harassment or have witnessed hate speech, you can report it to Exeter Speaks Out or in the instance of hate crime, we encourage you to report directly to the police.
Student-led solutions
We have invited community groups and society leaders to meet with us over the next few weeks to listen to and understand their perspectives and experiences, provide reassurance that we are taking this seriously, and answer any questions they may have.
Over the coming months, we’ll be working with students to help us create actionable strategies that can be put in place to support community cohesion on campus. This is to support lasting change at Exeter.
Thank you
We know this is an ongoing issue and not a quick fix. We’re taking this seriously and we’re committed to improving the student experience for everyone. Thank you once again for showing your solidarity and thank you in advance to all society leaders who organise events for cooperating with us on implementing the changes required to make Exeter safer and more inclusive for all.
Alex, Kira, Seb, Thomas and India [Guild Officers 2024/25]
Ali Chambers [Chief Executive]