Building Safer Spaces Together

By: Rylan Mascarenhas, Work Study Student

This week, the Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Decolonisation (EDID) at King's University College hosted its third Town Hall. These town halls are a brand new venture here at King’s usually hosted on the last Wednesday of every month, and provide the community with an opportunity to come together and have meaningful, fruitful discussions on key EDID issues on campus. At the November Town Hall, titled “Building Safer Spaces” faculty, staff and students came together to discuss what makes campus a place to safely and respectfully engage with differing perspectives, and to grow as a community. 

At the Town Hall, participants engaged in discussions both as a larger group, and in breakout groups, where questions such as what makes a space feel safer, unsafe, and when do you feel respected, prompted very engaging discussion from the participants. The group felt that a perceived lack of commitment to safety, unknown expectations, and unsafe terminology and vocabulary characterized unsafe spaces. The group spoke of how having easily recognisable and accessible exits, and having security features make a place feel physically safe as well as are influenced by any negative past experiences both inside and outside the space. Safer spaces are characterized by a judgment-free attitude, trust, a mutual respect for differing perspectives. Safer spaces often have clear expectations, are affirming, accessible to all, and create a sense of belonging. Safer spaces would also acknowledge and accept uncomfortable truths.

Those charged with the operation of these safer spaces should make efforts such as performing check-ins with users of the space to improve upon its safety, by ensuring that differences are acknowledged and accounted for respectfully and equitably. Markers of being respected by the Town Hall attendees included being seen and heard, engaging actively in sharing perspectives, and a sense of genuine caring and commitment to safety and equity. The group discussed the value of having allies that can respectfully and amicably provide guidance and support in navigating spaces, and how such efforts contribute to making a space feel safer.

Safer spaces are not spaces that just come to exist, but rather they are built by conscious and consistent efforts. In building and growing such safer spaces, we must actively strive to bring these ideas and more into realization. Building upon these ideas to have them be active and conscious tenets of safer spaces will ensure effective and sustainable spaces for our community at King’s. We must create judgment-free spaces by inviting and welcoming diverse experiences and identities, and we must build trust proactively. We need to create a sense of belonging built on mutual respect, affirmation, and a genuine desire to grow together. We must be the allies that support and stand behind those who need it, and elevate voices that need to be heard. Safer spaces are not just byproducts of our existence, but a continuously growing and evolving project, one that we all must build and have a duty to protect.