March 24, 2020
Campus Safety Strategies, Tips, & Resources for COVID-19
Previously: COVID-19 & Clery FAQs
Over the past three weeks many of you have been responding to the concerns and worries of students, their families, fellow administrators and faculty, and your own loved ones in relation to COVID-19. You have been adjusting your work functions to support students and employees, and to respond to issues many of us have never dealt with before.
As institutions share their questions and concerns with us, we want to keep you updated on possible strategies, tips, and resources to use as you begin to settle in to our new, but hopefully temporary, normal:
Preparing for Remote Incident Reports
As students and employees have time away from campus and opportunity to think and reflect, they may decide that now is the time to make an incident report. Alternatively, some individuals might be returning to stressful or even harmful living situations in having to leave campus. Therefore, it is so important to remind folks of how and when they can report an alleged criminal offense or policy violation during this time.
- Remind your campus community how they can make a report or file a disciplinary complaint while remote (i.e. online reporting form, current contact information).
- Revisit your own procedures for sharing information, like providing your written explanation of rights and options for those reporting instances of dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking via email.
- Inform your campus community directly of the institutional resources that are always available to them, even when off campus; as well as local and national resources available to them while they are away, particularly if they are in a dangerous situation (see linked resources at the end of this post).
Disciplinary Proceedings
Campuses are currently determining how to best prioritize and balance the needs of individuals versus the needs of the whole community more than ever and campus disciplinary procedures are no exception. You may be making some difficult decisions regarding whether investigations and adjudication procedures continue at this time and, if so, how.
- Check out the Association of Student Conduct Administration’s daily chat series beginning this week and continuing for the next four where they are hosting discussions for conduct administrators across the country to brainstorm solutions as COVID-19 continues to impact all aspects of a campus’ functioning.
- Ensure your most up-to-date disciplinary proceedings policies and procedures are available through your institution’s website for student and employee cases of dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking. Proactively communicate with your community about how such procedures are impacted by current circumstances.
- Ask what folks need. We are all living in a great time of uncertainty and each individual may desire something very different in their own process—understanding what those needs are before adjusting policies and procedures will help you make those decisions.
Hate Crimes and Bias Incidents
Sadly, as COVID-19 has spread so also has racism towards Chinese-Americans and international students. During this time, you should make all students and employees aware of actions and behaviors that would constitute a violation of your institution’s bias-incident policy and those that could be classified as a hate crime under state or federal law, and encourage them to report such incidents using your remote reporting procedures.
- The Clery Act defines hate crimes specifically and not all actions that might be a violation of an institution’s bias-incident policy would necessarily qualify for categorization as a hate crime under the Clery Act or in an institution’s Clery crime statistics.
- Classifying incidents as hate crimes under the Clery Act is just one way to acknowledge bias or hate and should not be the starting or stopping point for colleges and universities in working to prevent, address, and respond to such actions.
- Review Clery Center’s Explaining Hate Crimes under the Clery Act to further understand distinctions between hate crimes and bias incidents and what you can do to encourage reporting of all incidents of hate at your institution.
- Proactively identify and share resources available to support community members experiencing discrimination (see linked resources at the end of this post).
Continue to connect and share with each other – institutions of higher education are a community navigating this together and can benefit from collaboration during this difficult time. Clery Center will be hosting a no-cost virtual space to talk through these and other challenges you’re facing at your institution, so please keep an eye out for registration information coming soon.
Additional Resources:
|
April 09, 2020
Why Clery Still Matters
Previously: COVID-19 & Clery FAQs | Campus Safety Strategies, Tips, & Resources for COVID-19 | COVID-19 & Clery FAQs: Clery Geography
Over the past few weeks we’ve fielded questions from many of you as to how the Clery Act applies in response to COVID-19. When the Clery Act was enacted in 1990, lawmakers likely could not have predicted what campuses are facing right now. While amendments to the Clery Act account for what an institution should do to inform its community of an impending threat to health and safety, existing guidance does not, and likely cannot, fully address all the unique circumstances you’re navigating as a campus facing a global pandemic extending for months on end, disrupting our day-to-day life and work.
Several questions we’ve received are connected to whether or not the campus is following Clery “correctly” which is difficult to measure in the face of ever-shifting circumstances that include moving all academic offerings online, requiring all that can leave campus do so, and converting campus buildings like residence halls or athletic facilities into temporary housing or medical centers.
The Department of Education’s Office of Financial Student Aid (within which the Clery Compliance Division is housed) released updated guidance on Friday, April 3, which contains a small section focusing on emergency notification. As ED has not issued new guidance on other aspects of Clery, it is reasonable to expect they are not planning to exercise their enforcement authority unnecessarily during this crisis. As with similar situations, ED has expressed a desire to remain flexible and open to new needs as they arise, to the best of their ability.
As a result, there might be temptation to think through ways in which you can save time, money, and resources, particularly as institutions are looking ahead to a potentially grim financial future in the coming months. And while it may be a time of tough choices, we urge you to reconsider plans to cut campus safety or violence prevention and response services at this time. Uncertainty and fear cause an uptick in violence—support services are needed as soon as possible to respond to these occurrences or hopefully prevent them from occurring.
Here are a few considerations to focus on right now in relation to campus safety and the Clery Act:
- Reporting crimes: Individuals should still be able to report crimes remotely so it’s good to revisit or remind folks of how they would report any crime, one occurring now within the institution’s Clery geography or patrol jurisdiction or one that occurred previously that they are just now feeling comfortable sharing.
- Providing information on rights and options: With domestic violence rates increasing as folks are compelled to remain home and have fewer options for safely going in public, it is crucial to provide those who report being a victim of such crimes written information on their rights and options through the institution, which include being assisted in notifying local law enforcement if they choose. If you are discovering you’d like to rework your current written notification of rights and options document here is a sample Clery Center created to get you started. Additionally, all students and employees should receive written information on and off campus service providers in the areas of health, mental health, counseling, advocacy, visa and immigration assistance, legal assistance, and student financial aid as those services relate to supporting victims of dating violence, domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking. It would be a good time to reissue that written information to all campus community members as those same service providers could be of particular use right now to folks struggling with personal challenges related to COVID-19 and social distancing.
- Compiling Clery crime statistics for the ASR: Additionally, those of you composing annual security reports (ASRs) for the October 1, 2020 deadline are dealing with data from last year in reconciling statistics. Therefore, even though crime incident rates might be lower right now, there is still plenty of necessary work for Clery-adjacent roles to do.
- Maintaining the daily crime log: A daily crime log should still be maintained if you have a campus security department in any capacity. Unfortunately, crimes might still occur and be reported, and should be logged just as during any other time of low occupancy on campus.
Reframing what matters can feel overwhelming when the ground is constantly shifting but centering yourself in the reasons Clery exists – to keep your community connected with information and resources – can help you maintain direction and purpose in your efforts even as you adapt them to the current needs of your community.
|
|
April 01, 2020
COVID-19 FAQs update: Analyzing Clery geography in a coronavirus world
Previously: COVID-19 & Clery FAQs | Campus Safety Strategies, Tips, & Resources for COVID-19
Mid-way through week three of nationwide social distancing due to the coronavirus pandemic, many campuses have moved to remote working/learning and are now serving as potential surge spaces for hospitals or quarantine housing for medical professionals. This shift might bring Clery geography questions to mind. Below are some considerations for analyzing Clery geography in a coronavirus world:
- Campus buildings now used as surge spaces for medical treatment and/or quarantine: There has not been formal guidance from the Department of Education yet on whether or not these functions would qualify as meeting the educational purposes of the institution. Normally these buildings fall under on-campus or on-campus student housing Clery geography. Because the functions of these buildings are changing, barring any additional guidance from the Department, we recommend maintaining their classification as part of your Clery geography. Were they to eventually be included in your annual security report, institutions could provide a caveat with their statistics outlining the unique circumstances in which these buildings were utilized during this timeframe.
- With that in mind, we also encourage you to reach out to the Department of Education’s federal contractor, Westat, with campus-specific questions regarding your Clery geography as this helps to communicate areas where additional Department guidance is needed. You can reach them at [email protected].
- Students housed at “off-campus” sites like hotels: Use the same analysis as always to determine if such locations would meet the criteria for on-campus student housing (if they are within one-mile of the on-campus borders of the institution) or noncampus property (if the location is more than a mile away). These locations would retain their Clery geography classification as long as they retain the function of noncampus property or on-campus student housing, etc.
- Alternate work locations as “extensions of the department”: At some institutions policies and procedures indicate that remote or alternate work locations are considered extensions of the institution and, therefore, policies still apply. Consider, then, how such locations would be evaluated should a Clery crime take place there. Generally, Clery Act geography is connected to property owned or controlled by the institution or a student organization officially recognized by the institution. You can find the specifics of Clery geography in Chapter 2 of the Handbook for Campus Safety and Security Reporting. Page 2-21 highlights the difference between a space versus a program agreement or, in other words, the difference between a written agreement for use of physical space versus a written agreement to collaborate on a program but without specific control of space. Although the particulars of these agreements are important for identifying Clery geography, we can say that it is atypical (although not impossible) that an agreement would give the institution physical control over someone’s private home. For comparison, often host family situations within a study abroad program do not fall under Clery geography, because they normally do not give some significant control over space in the family home to the institution. Even so, it’s important to still consider what types of Clery Act crimes can take place virtually (like stalking or intimidation, which is evaluated for hate crime reporting), as Clery requirements are not the only thing guiding campus response. Chances are your disciplinary policies address this behavior – and you should still be prepared to receive reports of Clery crimes that took place (or are currently taking place) in your Clery geography.
Ongoing considerations for emergency notifications
Although many campuses have moved to remote learning, there may still be some individuals staying on campus who could not safely leave, as well as individuals considered essential personnel such as public safety. Your emergency notification requirements are in place to protect your on-campus community and to keep the campus informed, even if that is now a more limited group of people.
- By this point many campuses have issued emergency notifications, either because of a confirmed case of COVID-19 within the community or direct exposure to someone with a confirmed case of COVID-19. Remember that emergency notification policies should have procedures to provide necessary follow-up information. This still remains critical, even if many members of your community have moved off-campus. Since emergency notifications may be segmented, make sure to maintain an active list of who is still physically present on campus in case any future communications should be segmented to certain groups.
- Proactively inform your campus community if there are temporary changes to how facilities will be used in response to this crisis and who that will directly impact.
We’ll continue to share what we’re hearing as campuses navigate COVID-19, so if you have questions, please continue to reach out to us for technical assistance and support. We value the many ways campuses are showing up for one another during this time, and hope that we’ll have the opportunity to support you as you navigate this new temporary normal.
|
September 01, 2020
Addressing COVID-19 / Clery Act Misconceptions
To clarify a common misconception surfacing lately, the Clery Act does not currently and is not anticipated to require institutions of higher education to maintain or disclose statistics of positive COVID-19 cases, as these are not crimes.
The Clery Act does require institutions to make determinations about whether or not an immediate threat to the health or safety of its on-campus community exists, as, if it does, the campus must issue an emergency notification informing of the threat and what measures individuals should take to protect themselves.
Be sure to not conflate these two actions. Informing the campus community of an outbreak of COVID-19 through the tool of an emergency notification is not the same thing as counting and disclosing numbers of COVID-19 cases. While emergency notifications may, and often do, indicate the location of the emergency, including an illness outbreak, there is no requirement that they contain personally identifying information about those impacted. Remember that timely warnings and emergency notifications are two separate and distinct types of alerts under the Clery Act. Timely warnings are reserved for Clery Act crimes that have occurred and pose a serious or ongoing threat to the campus community. Emergency notifications are used for immediate threats to health and safety, which can extend to health emergencies such as COVID-19. As a result, institutions could limit an emergency notification to only the segment of the community directly impacted by an emergency as opposed to sending it to the entire campus community. Even so, in cases of outbreaks of contagious illnesses like COVID-19, many institutions may decide not to segment a notification because of the ease of transmission to a broader population.
As a reminder, the only guidance issued by the Department of Education regarding emergency notification expectations and requirements for COVID-19 so far was released on April 3, 2020 and can be found here.
Here is the guidance itself: Notifications Regarding an Immediate Threat to Health or Safety (§ 668.46)
“The Clery Act and its implementing regulations require institutions to notify the campus community upon the confirmation of a significant emergency or dangerous situation involving an immediate threat to the health or safety of students or staff occurring on campus. The Department does not interpret the statutory language as requiring institutions to give regular, on-going updates on COVID-19 or to proactively identify positive COVID-19 cases within the campus community. The Department also does not interpret the statutory language to apply to positive COVID-19 cases among individuals who are not attending classes, working, or residing on campus or to require notifications to such individuals.
An institution may satisfy the emergency notification requirements of the Clery Act and § 668.46 as follows: (1) provide students and employees a single notification through the regular means of communicating emergency notifications informing them about COVID-19 and necessary health and safety precautions, as well as encouraging them to obtain information from health care providers, state health authorities, and the CDC’s COVID-19 website; or (2) create a banner at the top of the institution’s homepage containing that same information, including a statement about the global pandemic and a link to the CDC’s website.”
It is the minimum that campuses must do to comply with the Clery Act according to the Department of Education, the enforcement authority of the Clery Act.
As with any questions regarding formal compliance determinations with the Clery Act we recommend reaching out to Westat, a federal contractor who provides technical assistance on the Clery Act on behalf of the Department of Education, the enforcement authority of the Clery Act. Westat can be reached at [email protected] and 800-435-5985.
Clery Center will continue to share information if there is updated guidance on reporting responsibilities in relation to COVID-19. Follow us on social media (Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Instagram) and sign up for our email alerts!
|
|
