This session, led by the University of Northampton, draws on nearly a decade of frontline experience within diverse communities, supporting victims of domestic and honour-based abuse in refuge and justice settings. The session aims to demonstrate how improved understandings of additional barriers to support faced by Black, minoritised, and international student victim-survivors can bring innovation to university support services and enhance outcomes.
Explore how intersecting forms of oppression and discrimination shape students’ experiences and access to support, and gain confidence to identify and challenge multi-agency bad practice, advocating for culturally appropriate pathways to manage risk and need. This session focuses on:
- The importance of embedding an intersectional approach to risk assessments.
- How to formally record risk factors such as racial trauma, adultification bias, and past negative experiences with professionals.
- The role of family and community dynamics in shaping help-seeking behaviours.
The session highlights the significance of victim-survivor-led services and the need for authentic voice in shaping support provisions, sharing best practice insights and case studies from the Sexual & Domestic Abuse service at the University of Northampton. The session concludes with reflections on creating inclusive and affirming spaces where Black, minoritised, and international student victim-survivors feel seen, heard, and safe.
×
Noor Da Silva
Sexual & Domestic Abuse (SVLO) Service Manager, University of Northampton
Noor Da Silva is the Sexual and Domestic Abuse Service Manager at the University of Northampton, leading the institution’s strategic and frontline response to Sexual and Domestic abuse. She oversees a specialist team of advocates, manages a caseload of high-risk clients and is responsible for the rollout of the university’s consent and prevention education strategy.
With almost a decade of experience across the criminal justice and VAWG sectors, Noor brings specialist knowledge in managing risk, dangerousness, and public protection in multi-agency environments. Her work has spanned prison settings, police and refuge services supporting survivors of high-risk abuse and working with women with multiple complex needs.
She is a passionate about embedding intersectional risk and black feminist practice into service design and ensuring culturally responsive approaches are central to frontline support. Noor has facilitated trauma-informed recovery programmes, developed collective and selfcare strategies for VAWG settings and is a specialist practitioner in Harmful Cultural Practices. She is also a member of the East Midlands Strategic Migration Partnership NRPF network.