{"id":60344,"date":"2025-01-31T16:45:55","date_gmt":"2025-01-31T16:45:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/activist\/mandatory-trigger-warnings-at-drexel-maybe-not\/"},"modified":"2025-01-31T16:45:55","modified_gmt":"2025-01-31T16:45:55","slug":"mandatory-trigger-warnings-at-drexel-maybe-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=60344","title":{"rendered":"Mandatory Trigger Warnings at Drexel? Maybe Not. |"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>A point I\u2019ve often made in response to sky-is-falling critics of classroom trigger warnings is that there\u2019s no substantial movement afoot to make them mandatory. Where trigger warnings have been adopted, it\u2019s been voluntarily by professors.<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, even activists who\u2019ve pushed for their use haven\u2019t typically attempted to have them made a requirement. Last year\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/columbiaspectator.com\/opinion\/2015\/04\/30\/our-identities-matter-core-classrooms\">notorious Columbia University\u00a0op-ed<\/a> on the subject merely \u201cproposed that [the university\u2019s\u00a0Center for the Core Curriculum] issue a letter to faculty about potential trigger warnings and suggestions for how to support triggered students,\u201d while 2014\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20131222174936\/http:\/new.oberlin.edu\/office\/equity-concerns\/sexual-offense-resource-guide\/prevention-support-education\/support-resources-for-faculty.dot\">Oberlin College\u00a0document on the subject<\/a>\u2014since withdrawn\u2014was explicitly framed as advisory rather than directive. (A<a href=\"https:\/\/www.as.ucsb.edu\/senate\/resolutions\/a-resolution-to-mandate-warnings-for-triggering-content-in-academic-settings\/\">\u00a0student government resolution passed at UC Santa Barbara<\/a> in February 2014 did call for mandatory trigger warnings, but it had no formal authority and was essentially ignored by the university.)<\/p>\n<p>Today, however, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thefire.org\/think-trigger-warnings-are-never-mandatory-on-campus-think-again\/\">FIRE reports<\/a> that \u201cthere are several colleges and universities that, as part of their sexual misconduct policies and procedures, require professors to use trigger warnings in the classroom,\u201d citing a passage from Drexel University\u2019s sexual misconduct policy\u2014replicated in the policies of at least four other colleges\u2014that reads as follows:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left:30px;\">\u201c[i]t is expected that instructors will offer appropriate warning and accommodation regarding the introduction of explicit and triggering materials used.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This is\u00a0closer to a mandate than anything I\u2019ve seen or heard of before, and as policy it definitely\u00a0takes the trigger warning debate in a new direction, but it\u2019s not quite as clear as FIRE suggests that it amounts to a mandate.<\/p>\n<p>For starters, the FIRE extract leaves out important context for the quote. Here\u2019s the full text of the relevant passage:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left:30px;\">Examples of behavior that might be considered sexual or gender-based harassment or misconduct include, but are not limited to:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left:30px;\">[. . .]<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left:30px;\">Non-academic display or circulation of written materials or pictures degrading to an individual(s) or gender group (It is expected that instructors will offer appropriate warning and accommodation regarding the introduction of explicit and triggering materials used.).<\/p>\n<p>Note that the list that this entry appears on is a list\u00a0of actions that \u201cmight be considered\u201d misconduct rather than a list of prohibited acts. Note also that the non-use of trigger warnings does not appear as a main entry on the list but as a parenthetical.<\/p>\n<p>In context, then, the statement about trigger warnings is an aside about \u201cexpected\u201d behavior rather than a formal directive. And while one could certainly read \u201cexpect\u201d as a veiled mandate, other instances\u00a0of the word in the same document clearly refer to behavior that is hoped-for but not compelled. Consider the following examples:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left:30px;\">\u201cNot every individual will be prepared to make a report to the University or to law enforcement, and individuals are not expected or required to pursue a specific course of action.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left:30px;\">\u201cThe University expects all community members to take reasonable and prudent actions to prevent or stop an act of sexual harassment or misconduct. Taking action may include direct intervention, calling law enforcement, or seeking assistance from a person in authority. Community members who choose to exercise this positive moral obligation will be supported by the University and protected from retaliation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the first of these quotes\u00a0the word \u201cexpected\u201d is explicitly distinguished from \u201crequired,\u201d and in the second an expectation is characterized as reflecting a moral obligation rather than an institutional requirement.<\/p>\n<p>Is it possible that a professor at Drexel (or one of these other colleges) could be disciplined for, say, screening\u00a0hardcore porn in a classroom setting without warning? Definitely. But\u00a0that would be possible even\u00a0in the absence of this policy. Given that, it\u2019s not immediately obvious to me how much of a change this\u00a0represents.<\/p>\n<p>As I said above, these policies\u00a0certainly strike me as a significant development in the national debate over trigger warnings. To my knowledge, they\u2019re the only formal, college-wide policies in the country to even recommend the use of trigger warnings in the classroom. And the fact that they\u2019ve flown under the radar until now suggests that there may well be more\u2014and perhaps more explicit\u2014policies in place that haven\u2019t yet attracted\u00a0notice. I\u2019ll be following up on this, both in respect to the five campuses that have adopted this policy and more generally.<\/p>\n<p>In\u00a0the absence of more information about how this language is\u00a0being interpreted and implemented, to describe them as\u00a0explicit\u00a0mandates strikes me as unwarranted. If\u00a0I were an anti-trigger-warning professor on one of these campuses, though? I\u2019d certainly be asking my administration some pointed questions.<\/p>\n<p>More soon.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A point I\u2019ve often made in response to sky-is-falling critics of classroom trigger warnings is that there\u2019s no substantial movement afoot to make them mandatory. Where trigger warnings have been adopted, it\u2019s been voluntarily by professors. Indeed, even activists who\u2019ve pushed for their use haven\u2019t typically attempted to have them made a requirement. Last year\u2019s\u00a0notorious [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12022],"tags":[33566,33565,22089,21940],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-60344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-activist","tag-drexel","tag-mandatory","tag-trigger","tag-warnings"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Mandatory Trigger Warnings at Drexel? 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