The Rady Faculty of Health Sciences and the College of Rehabilitation Sciences (CoRS) continue to strengthen their commitment to creating safe, respectful and accountable learning and working environments. Over the past several months, CoRS has actively engaged in a range of initiatives focused on sexual violence prevention and response.
We hosted three “Responding to Disclosures of Sexual Violence” workshops – one tailored for leaders and two for all faculty and staff. These sessions were delivered in partnership with the Office of Human Rights & Conflict Management, the Office of Professionalism and the Sexual Violence Resource Centre, providing participants with practical skills and clear pathways for trauma-informed support.
The college dean and the director of the Office of Professionalism met with the registrars from the occupational therapy, physical therapy and respiratory therapy regulatory bodies to review duty-to-report and duty-to-protect obligations, ensuring our policies and practices remain aligned with provincial and professional standards as well as those of the UM. A panel discussion on these responsibilities and the moral and ethical obligations will be offered to faculty and staff early in the new year. We also agreed to meet to draft a short written document outlining the duty-to-report and duty-to-protect obligations that all faculty, staff and students owe to one another. This will be used for onboarding new faculty and staff, as well as for new student orientations. A document for clinical/fieldwork educators will also be developed in the new year.
Finally, students have been actively consulted on revisions to the Prevention of Learner Mistreatment Guideline and on the newly proposed Professional Unsuitability By-Law, helping ensure these important frameworks reflect learner needs, promote safety, and support accountability across programs.