The Last Taboo, an activism group against sexual harassment based at the University of York, have revealed they are currently working to set up other societies at other universities.
One of the co-founders, Kelly Balmer, also YUSU’s incoming Community and Wellbeing Officer, told York Vision that since starting they have been contacted by students looking to set up groups on their own campuses.
Kelly said: “The overwhelming support from both students at York and students at other universities has been fantastic and we are really looking forward to enabling students at different universities to carry out what we have done at York”.
“To enable other students to raise awareness of such an important issue… to help improve the current provision in place at their university is something that is so important to us”.
The Last Taboo have also been successful in developing a National Union of Students policy with The Red Flag Campaign, YUSU, and Sheffield Hallam Students Union, with the policy achieving a place in the top six and is set to be discussed at the upcoming NUS conference in April.
Kelly told Vision that: “We are hoping that this policy gets voted for at the NUS conference as it will help a lot with starting up at other universities… it also gives the NUS direction and mandate to address the issue of sexual violence within UK universities even more, as well as directly addressing the use of NDAs on students”.
You can find the link to the policy here.
Since starting, the co-founders of The Last Taboo, Kelly Balmer, and Imogen Horrocks, have run a series of consultations within the University, with a report set to be released on April 10 2021, which will overview all issues relating to sexual violence at the University and subsequent recommendations.
“We have had a total of 419 responses in our consultations from students at York, this speaks volumes.”
“We are both really excited for the reports to be published on the 10th April 2021. We think this could really help the University of York improve the way that it addresses the issues of sexual violence that students face as they clearly outline the thoughts and concerns of students”.
“The reports are not an easy read, but one of the best things about them is that they will be able to remind students at York that they are not alone in this”.