Universities would have to maintain a register of personal relationships between staff and students under new plans from the Office for Students (OfS).
It’s a central and eye-catching proposal that forms part of a wider consultation on regulating harassment and sexual misconduct in English higher education – that also includes greater support for victims, and mandatory training for students and staff.
Elsewhere on the site OfS CEO Susan Lapworth introduces the proposals, and my colleague Jim Dickinson identifies some of the key developments and challenges in what’s being proposed.
But here I’ll focus on the staff/student relationships aspect of the proposed new condition of registration. The “relationships register” – very much the headline being sold to the press in this package – would apply to personal relationships in circumstances where a staff member has particular responsibilities towards a student, for example where an academic is responsible for assessing a student’s work.
