The University of Oxford is to ban staff from entering into intimate relationships with students that they teach, amid intense sector debate on the topic.

Oxford¡¯s new policy, which will be effective from 17 April, prohibits staff from forming intimate relationships with any student they have any responsibility for, including applicants, and ¡°strongly discourage[s]¡± any ¡°other close personal relationship with them which transgresses the boundaries of professional conduct¡±.

Staff who fail to comply with the policy may face disciplinary action.

The new policy comes after the English sector regulator proposed that universities should have to maintain a register of all staff-student personal relationships, as part of wider efforts to combat harassment and sexual misconduct.

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The Office for Students said this was its preferred option, rather than an outright sector-wide ban on such relationships, but some academics have said that prohibition would send a clearer message that exploitation of students was not acceptable.

An Oxford spokeswoman said that the university¡¯s previous policy had strongly discouraged intimate relationships between staff and students but had not banned them.

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¡°This policy has been developed over the course of many months ¨C to allow for time to consult across the university ¨C and is not in response to the recent OfS consultation in this area or recent media reports,¡± she said.

Under the OfS¡¯ proposals, academics who failed to disclose intimate relationships with students would face dismissal. Demonstrating progress in this area is being made a condition of registration by the OfS after it said some institutions had been?slow to prioritise these issues.

Oxford said that in the case of existing staff-student relationships?that were reported under the new policy, the focus would be ¡°on avoiding conflicts of interest by ensuring the staff member ceases to have, or does not acquire, any responsibility for the student¡±.

A 2020 study of 102 higher education institutions in England and Wales found that only six institutions explicitly forbade sexual relationships between staff and students. Fifty-one simply discouraged such relationships, and 45 gave no guidance at all.

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However, a number of universities have moved to tighten the rules since then.