A student comes home to her dorm to find a nasty racial slur scrawled on her message board. Someone running past Akwe:kon yells out a war whoop. A campus employee casually says, "Oh, that's so gay" as a lesbian co-worker stands nearby.

Cornell's Bias Incidence Response Program has been tracking -- and helping to prevent -- such acts of bigotry, harassment and intimidation since its inception in 2000. Between 50 and 60 cases of bias in which the person responsible is unknown or not readily identifiable are reported each year. Incidents in which the person responsible is known can be categorized as crimes or complaints and are handled not only by the bias response program but also by several other university organizations, depending on the incident. The organizations are listed online at http://www.cornell.edu/diversity/biasreport.cfm.

Most bias incidence reports involve race, sexual orientation and gender, said one of the program founders, Lynette Chappell-Williams, director of the Office of Workforce Diversity, Equity and Life Quality. "The reports are a snapshot of what's happening around campus, so we can give that information to other units that address bias activity, like the University Diversity Council."

Anyone who experiences or witnesses an act of bias can anonymously file a report or contact one of some 50 reporting-team members, who span the campus. A list of team members can be found online at http://www.cornell.edu/diversity/biasreport.cfm.

"It's a personal touch, a one-on-one," said Alan Mittman, associate director of Equity Programs in the Office of Workforce Diversity, Equity and Life Quality. "It's someone who can help the person deal with [the incident] and direct them to the right resources."

Within 24 hours, the team member will file a report, and the bias program staff will determine the next steps. If the incident occurred at a residence hall, Campus Life is alerted; in other cases, Cornell Police or the Office of the University Ombudsman may be contacted. The bias program staff notifies the judicial administrator's office when a student lodges a complaint against another student. All reports of incidents in which the individual's identity is unknown are listed online at http://www.ohr.cornell.edu/resolveWork/biasDiscrimHarass/index.html on the "Bias Response Update" link. Other incidents are not made public for reasons of confidentiality, Mittman said.

The bias program also offers education to prevent future incidents. For example, talks last year to staff from eight library units resulted in two reports. Perhaps one of its biggest successes has been raising the awareness of undergraduates in residence halls about what constitutes a challenge to Cornell's diversity, Chappell-Williams said. "In their high schools, students might have referred to each other as dykes or fags and had no clue that it can be problematic. There are meetings in the residence halls where it can be brought up."

Now in its ninth year, the program is facing two challenges. First is how to publicize the program to students living off campus. Laura Romeo '09, a resident adviser on West Campus, is on a subcommittee addressing the problem. She also wrote about the project for a service-learning class, she said. "When you say Bias Incident Response Program, no one knows what you're talking about. I find it ironic because when you're walking down the street or in any building on campus, you hear a lot of unfortunate speech. You hear, 'That's retarded.' These words are so common. But people don't realize the negative effect they can have."

The second challenge is how to address bias issues that impact the broader university, Chappell-Williams said.

Nonetheless, other universities have adopted many aspects of the program, and Cornell learns from the process, Chappell-Williams said. "It unearths incidents that otherwise might go unnoticed by university officials. But we want to know about these things, so that we can address them in a way that makes sense."

The program's Web site is http://www.ohr.cornell.edu/resolveWork/biasDiscrimHarass/biasResponse/Program.html.