Know how gender ideas and traditions affect behavior,
including their own.
Each of us must understand the issues involved in how we interpret and respond to gender.
We must begin by paying attention to the experiences and statistics that illuminate how
women and men encounter different standards and expectations.
Evaluate their own ideas and behavior in this
context.
Act in ways that show respect for the individual.
We must be particularly vigilant
whenever we make evaluations of judgments about others. Such
decisions may be informal – expecting certain behaviors because of
someone’s gender; judging the intelligence of a speaker without
listening to what is being said; determining what someone wants or
needs without inquiring. Such decisions may be formal—faculty
evaluations of students (grading, recommendations, advising,
scholarship); evaluations of faculty and staff (merit, promotions,
grants, job assignments, opportunities); peer judgments (faculty and
staff searches and reviews; student elections); student evaluations
of faculty; staff evaluations of supervisors and administrators.
Actively discourage those who behave in ways that are
gender-biased.
Every member of this community
has a responsibility for disapproving, interrupting and
disassociating ourselves from inappropriate behavior when we observe
it, especially among our peers. We can create a positive environment
by a clear and strong community consensus that gender biased
behavior is inappropriate and unethical.
Actively encourage behavior that is gender sensitive.
Gender is an important part of humanness and we
would all be impoverished by rigidly treating everyone alike. Gender
can be a source of valuable talents, insights and accomplishments
and we seek to appreciate its effect on all of us while preserving
equity and fairness.