Growing mustaches in November is fun, but it also benefits a mission for men’s health. The “Movember” movement took place on campus this year for the second time.

Movember is a global movement aimed at raising funds and awareness for men’s health by encouraging participants to grow unique mustaches. The participants promote their mustaches through social media to raise money and awareness for men’s health. The Movember foundation also hosts various events throughout the year to raise awareness and funds for the cause. It was brought to the UO campus by Eric Garcia last year.

Nikita Ramakrishnan, a senior at UO and the Movember coordinator on campus, worked with the counseling center’s Outreach Coordinator Suzie Stadelman to create an inclusive event on campus for all genders to support men’s health.

At UO, there are several events throughout the month of November aimed at raising awareness and making a lasting impact on students, according to Ramakrishnan.

“The college age is hugely about identity development,” Ramakrishnan said. “I think that it’s a pivotal time when we are developing relationships intimately, with friends and family, creating our identity and growing.”

Movember was created during 2003 in Australia by two friends as a way to bring the mustache trend back into fashion and has since expanded into a global charity raising money and awareness for men’s health, according to the Movember website. They have focused their efforts to combat testicular cancer, prostate cancer and suicide through fundraising and awareness events across the globe. By 2030, they plan to reduce the number of men dying prematurely by 25 percent, the website states.

Ramakrishnan said that Movember on UO’s campus is similar.

“We’ve just added additional focuses for men’s mental health and men’s identity development. Movember encapsulates men’s different identities outside of what’s standard or normative in society,” Ramakrishnan said.

The movement encourages people of all genders to participate in raising awareness for men’s health.

“It’s important for everyone to know this information because we all have men in our lives,” Stadelman said.

At UO, the main focus is raising awareness, rather than funds because, according to Stadelman, there are certain rules about faculty and staff asking students for money.

“If funds are raised on the side then that’s great, but the main goal is to start conversations and destigmatize seeking help,” Stadelman said.

Ramakrishnan’s major is women and gender studies. Coordinating Movember serves as her required internship credit for the major. She started planning the event in July by contacting the various departments within the university to hold events and participate in Movember.

Each department created its own events based on what its target audience would want to go to, Ramakrishnan said. For example, the UO rec center is hosting a yoga class for men’s health on Nov. 12, and the Duck Nest is hosting a Depression and Seasonal Affective Disorder workshop on Nov. 16. A complete list of the events can be found on the UO event calendar online.

On Nov. 9, Common Grounds hosted a Movember event called Speak Easy, an open mic night in support of men’s health.

Collin Hannatty, a freshman who attended the event said, as a man, “being hurt or injured makes you seem weak.” He said it’s important to talk about this issue at the college level “because we’re still in that age of trying to find out who we are.”

One of the ways they are engaging students to participate in Movember is through a photo contest.

According to Ramakrishnan, there is an ongoing photo contest throughout the month of November open to all students. After submitting a photo and brief description of what healthy masculinity is to the student through the UO Calendar page, they are entered into a raffle to win ten dollar gift cards to EMU vendors. One person will win a Fitbit as well, Ramakrishnan said.

“It’s a really important message to send to men, that if you’re struggling, it’s okay to reach out for help,” Stadelman said.

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The University of Oregon recently enacted a new “Responsible Reporting” policy aimed at empowering survivors of sexual assault and discrimination.

Darci Heroy, associate vice president and Title IX coordinator, worked with the university Senate appointed Responsible Reporting Working Group to create the new policy that became effective on Sept. 15th. The new policy is directed at the student’s interests, requiring university employees to take actions in terms of reporting based on what the student wants to do.

Both national research and the research conducted by UO psychology professor Jennifer Freyd concluded survivors need control over the reporting process to recover fully.

The policy has received positive feedback from the faculty as well as the University Senate. Senate President Chris Sinclair said of the new policy, “I’m extremely happy with it. I think it will be a model policy for a lot of universities.”

The “Responsible Reporting” policy is intended to make reporting instances of sexual harassment and gender based discrimination tailored to fulfill the survivor’s needs. All university employees hold the same responsibility in this process to ensure students have accessibility to the same resources and are all treated equally and supported fully.

“One of the things that’s really important to someone healing in that context is regaining some autonomy — some control over themselves — because it’s such an intimate violation. That loss of control is part of the harm,” Heroy said.

According to Heroy, students expressed that there was a fear of immediate reporting and lack of a say in the process. Previously, the policy required only certain employees to be reporters and did not take into account the affected student’s needs.

Heroy stated the new policy clarifies the duties of the university employees by educating them on how to help a student that comes forward with a report. If a student wants to file an official report, the university employee contacts the Title IX coordinator. If a student does not want to file an official report, the university employee directs the student to various confidential resources to ensure the student is supported and helped.

“If a student wants you to report, then you help them do that. If they don’t, then you still have some obligation to connect them with support and resources,” Heroy said.

The University worked to ensure that these resources were accessible to both faculty and students as well. Employees have access to an online reporting tool that allows them to report the instance and lists various resources to direct students to, including the 24-hour SAFE hotline and the University Health Center.

Assistant Director for Orientation Programs Keith Frazee said, “We share the safe.uoregon.edu website with all new students multiple times during their orientation and transition to the UO. From that site, options for reporting and support seem clear, and I sincerely hope those most needing the information are able to access it easily.”

Last year, a similar policy was drafted but failed in the senate by one vote. The policy focused more on the administrators rather than the survivors, which prompted a group of students to give “a very impassioned testimony about how their experience [under the previous policy] traumatized them, and how the policy that was proposed at the time would not change things substantially,” said Senate President Chris Sinclair.

The Senate responded by creating the policy that is in effect today, which aims to empower survivors and grant them autonomy.

“I want students to feel empowered, to seek help [and] to know that we are here and interested in helping them be successful and completing their education and achieving their goals,” Heroy stated.

Follow Hannah Kanik on Twitter: @hannah_kanik

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The University of Oregon revealed the renderings for the new Knight Campus for Accelerated Scientific Impact on Friday.

President Schill and Patrick Phillips, the Executive Director of the new campus, announced the development of the Knight Campus in the Giustina Ballroom of the Ford Alumni Center to a crowd of approximately 200 people including faculty, alumni and community members.

The new campus was funded by Phil and Penny Knight’s donation of $500 million in October 2016 and a $50 million donation from the Oregon state legislature. The new campus, set to open in 2020, will house research facilities and resources for students to collaborate and innovate more than they ever have before and invite acclaimed faculty to the University.

The university has been working for the past eight months to create a design for the facility. UO hired architects in January of 2017 from the Portland-based firm Bora Architects and the New York-based firm Ennead architects and sent them across the country along with faculty and researchers to gain inspiration from other leading Universities’ designs.

“The building wraps in around itself, it’s highly transparent, has double height with mezzanines that brings everyone much closer together,” said architect John O’Toole of Bora Architects.

According to Phillips, “A whole wing of the building that is going to support graduate internship building” and undergraduate research as well. The goal is to expedite research to impact not only the local community, but the world.

Schill spoke to the crowd, expressing the excitement of this new project. Though the buildings are beautiful, Schill stated, “It’s about what’s inside, [and] the future of our community.”

There will also be a skybridge across Franklin Blvd to unite the facility and serve as shelter from the rain when walking to and from classes. President Schill stated the new addition will “maximize our potential to educate future leaders.”

Patrick Phillips presented a video to the crowd that displayed models and flyovers of the new building.

“Most of our students maybe won’t be here when it opens, but it’s part of their legacy,” Phillips said.

Following the presentation, UO hosted a gallery-style open house where pictures and blueprints of the new facility were displayed on easels. 3D models of the buildings were available for viewing as well.

Gary Welch, a UO alumni who graduated in 1971, said, “The innovation is awesome. To see it in my alma mater is fantastic. They’re trying to do something here that is really special.” Welch went on to state how UO’s science program will improve. “You don’t take leaps like this very often. This is an enormous leap.”

Here are more images of the Knight Campus:

The University of Oregon released this video to announce the design:

Will Campbell contributed to the reporting of this article.

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The University of Oregon has increased its alcohol education and prevention efforts in the past six years and aims to improve preventative efforts to have a greater effect on students.

The UO substance abuse education and prevention policy has expanded in the past six years to provide more services to students. Alcohol-related crimes have decreased in the past seven years while drug-related crimes have increased. The Department of Prevention Services plans to incorporate more impactful techniques to address the ever-changing needs of students.

Newly appointed Director of Prevention Services Kerry Frazee plans to implement more impactful policies to keep students safe, including community-based education and targeting the misperceptions surrounding alcohol.

“Our national data for attending colleges and universities shows consistently that substance use is an issue,” Frazee said.

Incoming UO students are required to take an online alcohol orientation before attending the university to educate themselves on the risks associated with alcohol and drugs. For the past six years, the university has used the program “Alcohol Edu.”

The Department of Prevention Services switched to the online education program “Third Millennium Classrooms” this fall. This program is said to cover more broad topics beyond just the negative effects of substance use and challenge the traditional college life stereotypes of drinking and partying.

“We want our students to know about the misperceptions of college substance use that aren’t actual realities,” Frazee said.

Freshman business major Brittany Nguyen said Third Millennium Classroom helps students and shows the negative outcomes of drinking. When asked if there was anything about the program that could be improved, Nguyen said the university has “already made [the program] pretty accessible,” and that “it was very informative and probably helps a lot of freshmen.”

Frazee said she has several ideas and techniques she plans to enact in order to create a safe environment for students. For example, Frazee’s ideas for change include “more intentional community approaches to prevention in trusted settings,” such as group alcohol education sessions where students are in a group they are comfortable in.

Frazee said she aims to “make sure our students are getting something more than just an online course.”

UO’s annual fire and safety reports from 2013 and 2017 state that liquor law violations have decreased from 1030 violations in 2010 to 778 violations in 2016. On the other hand, drug law violations have increased from 101 violations in 2010 to 320 violations in 2016.  

The UO substance abuse prevention and education program now includes collaboration with specific student groups such as fraternity and sorority life and the athletic departments.

The program has also expanded several other policies over the past six years. The department has begun using data, evaluations and assessments to determine the scope and future success of the program as a whole.

The university alcohol and illegal drug policy has also created a more conclusive definition of marijuana usage in the past six years. According to the 2017 Alcohol and Drug Policy, the local laws surrounding marijuana usage went from one restrictive law to five. A more explicit definition of marijuana use has been included in the years after the legalization of marijuana in the state of Oregon as well.  

“There are some culture shifts that need to happen around substance abuse and misuse,” Frazee said.

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The University of Oregon Police Department officers will soon have access to semi-automatic “patrol rifles” with high-capacity magazines. Officers will also be using Tasers that, when used, will activate body cams, according to an announcement Wednesday in a UO senate meeting. The department will also get a bomb-sniffing dog.

The new program is intended to be used for critical and active threats on campus and provide increased accuracy and distance, according to UOPD.

UOPD Chief Matthew Carmichael said the rifles will be kept in locked gun safes in patrol cars. The rifles will also have ammo that can penetrate body armor.

UOPD Chief Matthew Carmichael (Courtesy of UO)

“It’s imperative that we move forward with the patrol rifle program,” said Carmichael. “I’m responsible for the safety of this entire community.”

The UOPD will train officers to use the rifles with the current state requirements. Officers will be trained for accuracy, decision making and how to handle escalation and de-escalation of force.

A semi-automatic rifle fires a single shot for each trigger pull and automatically reloads after every shot.

Thanks to a $49,000 grant, the UOPD will now be able to purchase body cameras for all officers that can be activated manually as well as whenever an officer activates a Taser. Each officer will be assigned a specific body camera to ensure the recorded information is connected to the correct officer. Previously officer had worn body cameras but they used multiple different models all in trial periods.

The new Tasers will also be yellow so that they are not confused with firearms. Additionally, these will give officers a non-lethal option when choosing to use force and have a range of 25 feet.

“No one will use Tasers without the proper training and certification,” said Carmichael.

The police will also get a bomb-sniffing dog and hire a handler for the dog. The selection of these dogs will be made with involvement from University Athletics. The dogs are intended to improve campus safety, protect campus facilities and will not be “bite dogs.”

Correction: A former version of this article stated that officers will carry rifles. The rifles will be locked in patrol cars and used for specific incidents.

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The university faculty senate is working to create less biased and more informative course evaluations through a targeted task force and increased student input.

Last May, the University senate discovered sexist and racist correlations in the results of student course evaluations. Senate president Chris Sinclair appointed a task force to address the issue and conduct further research last June. The findings confirmed that course evaluations bred biased and misleading information regarding both student success rates and instructor performances.

Senate President Chris Sinclair appointed Bill Harbaugh and Sierra Dawson as co-chairs of the teaching evaluation task force to solve the issue going forward, and plan to include student perspectives in the creation of less biased questions.  

Intensive research from universities across the country contributed to the senate’s conclusions. The findings suggested instructors who are women or people of color are receiving lower teaching evaluation scores overall, despite the higher student performance in not only entry-level courses, but advanced courses as well.

The main issue lies in the types of questions asked in the evaluations. The report analyzed “the influence of a variety of factors commonly hypothesized to bias [Student Evaluations of Teaching] scores,” and investigated the relationship between this data and the student’s performance. The report concluded that “the conflicting evidence surrounding the relationship between academic rank and SET scores suggests that this bias may in fact exist.”

Co-chair of the teaching evaluation task force Bill Harbaugh stated, “We want to make sure that the questions measure something useful, and we want to make sure that the questions are not biased against women or minorities.”

Current course evaluation questions focus more on whether a student liked a course or liked a professor, rather than if that teacher was successful in teaching the students or if the students actually learned something.

Harbaugh went on to conclude that the current course evaluation questions are “not just not helpful, but are actively harmful.”

Changing the course evaluations will assist teachers in gauging what their students are learning and which teaching methods are most effective. “The questions that we ask don’t lead to changes,” Harbaugh stated. The data could and does negatively affect future job acquisition for professors, as well as their job security at the University of Oregon.

In regards to the biases of the students, University senate president Chris Sinclair said, “Once we say there are equity issues in these evaluations, most fair-minded people will say, ‘Okay yes, there’s a problem there; let’s change it.’”

Sinclair said that “students these days are very intelligent about diversity and equity issues,” and hopes that students are sympathetic of these changes.

The senate is experimenting with various new ideas to improve the evaluations. Sinclair proposed in-class evaluations or even less frequent ones to ensure that students answer these improved questions fully and honestly. For example, he suggested having students evaluate one instructor per term rather than all of their instructors.

Sinclair emphasized the importance of student input to these evaluations as well. The senate is planning to include student input for the new evaluations and hopes to engage with their ideas in town hall meetings throughout the next year.

“In no way are we trying to take away the voice of students,” Sinclair said.

Course Evaluations icon in Duckweb. (Picture from Duckweb)

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