USM Bias Incident Report Form

Relevant Excerpt

The University of Southern Maine supports and promotes diversity and does not condone any bias or harassment. USM encourages all faculty, staff, and students to report incidents of bias or harassment.

This form should be used by USM students, faculty, and staff to report incidents of bias based on, but not limited to, race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, citizenship status, age, disability, genetic information, and veteran status. 

The USM Bias Response Team has been established to respond to incidents of bias or harassment involving students (this includes student-to-student incidents and situations where a student has experienced or may have caused harm). For incidents that involve only faculty or staff, cases may be referred to the Office of Equity, Inclusion, and Community Impact, USM Human Resources, or the UMS Office of Equal Opportunity.

Some examples of behaviors that can be reported using this form are:

• A student makes a racist, anti-Semitic, or anti-LGBTQ+ comment, joke, or statement to a peer
• A faculty member uses bias-based language in a classroom setting
• The display of, or the vandalism of personal or university property with symbols known to be discriminatory or bias-based (e.g. swastikas, hate speech, etc.)
• The disrespecting of diversity spaces or symbols (the removal of a pride flag, the destruction or disruption of culturally-specific items, etc.)

USM respects the sensitivity of the information that may be included in this form. This report can be filled out anonymously. Filing this incident report notifies Sarah Holmes, Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs and Deputy Title IX Coordinator, and Meghan Barrett, Director of Intercultural Student Affairs. Sarah and Meghan currently co-chair the Bias Response Team for USM.