Provost Carolyn Dever invited students to participate in the College’s first-ever sexual assault climate survey today, which will be accessible to all undergraduate and graduate students until April 23.
The Association of American Universities organized the survey and distributed it to 28 college campuses with a total of 900,000 students for this spring.
Title IX coordinator Heather Lindkvistsaid that the survey provides students with an opportunity to share their perspectives on and experiences with sexual assault, sexual misconduct, dating violence, domestic violence and stalking on campus.
Lindkvist said that the survey would give the College an idea of the prevalence rate of sexual assault on campus. Currently, she said, the College only has a sense of incident rates from reported or disclosed incidents.
She noted that the data from the survey would help the College assess their current resources and sexual assault policy and will be helpful for the development of the four-year education and prevention plan proposed in the “Moving Dartmouth Forward” plan.
Associate provost for institutional research Alicia Betsinger, who serves as the university coordinator for the survey, wrote in an email that it may prove challenging to gather representative data from across campus, but that she hopes students will understand the importance of the survey.
Betsinger said that Westat, the statistical services firm that helped develop the survey, is offering students incentives for participating in the survey. Four thousand students will be randomly selected to receive a $5 Amazon gift card upon completion of the survey. In addition, the approximately 2,300 remaining students will be entered into a lottery to win $500 if they visit the survey. The lottery incentive does not require students to complete the survey. The cost of the incentives is included in the $68,000 cost of the survey, Lindkvist wrote in an email.
“We need to take a data-informed approach as we look at broadening programs on campus and meeting students where they’re at, in terms of intellectual development and personal development,” Lindkvist said.
She said that students ask for and need different resources at various points in their education.
Lindkvist said that the Title IX office worked with Betsinger, the Office of the Dean of the College, the Office of Public Affairs and assistant dean and director of the Masters of Business Administration program at Tuck School of Business Sally Jaeger to implement and promote awareness of the survey.
Outreach includes posters, social media engagement and radio advertisements as well as communicating with multiple student organizations, work that is still under way, Lindkvist said. College President Phil Hanlon encouraged students to participate in the survey in a campus-wide email yesterday evening.
Lindkvist said that while it would be wonderful to have 100 percent participation, the survey organizers would be thrilled by a 60 percent student participation rate. She noted that students have voiced interest in taking climate surveys.
A request for an external sexual assault climate survey was part of the 2014 Student Presidential Committee on Sexual Assaultrecommendations, Student Presidential Committee on Sexual Assaultoutreach and communications chairLily Fagin ’16 said. In addition, a request for a general climate survey was included in the “Freedom Budget,” Lindkvist noted.
A team of experts worked in conjunction with Westat to develop the approximately 20-minute survey, which is based on an instrument developed by the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault. Participating universities can chose whether or not to disclose aggregate data from their institution, Lindkvist said, noting that the College has already committed to sharing this data.
Some external experts criticized the survey for an apparent lack of transparency because it does not require participating institutions to release data. Experts have also pointed to the $68,000 cost of the survey and suggested that an internal survey would cut costs as well as provide more tailored questions.
Lindkvist said that community members, including students, requested an external survey because it provides the College with an opportunity to compare its results with peer institutions. She noted that the survey includes five Dartmouth-specific questions on student experience with and knowledge of resources on campus. Lindkvist noted that the College also uses other methods to collect more Dartmouth-specific information, including focus groups and workshops.
“People are constantly making this argument that it’s a problem here and a problem everywhere,” Fagin said. “It’s important to have the comparison data with other schools to know where we stand.”
She noted that if other schools’ results are more favorable, the College could look at those institutions’ policies and resources.
She said that Dartmouth’s unique social culture means that a specific survey would have its benefits. She also noted, however, that we could administer both types of surveys and that conducting an external survey does not preclude the implementation of an internal one.
Interim co-director for the Wellness Center and Sexual Assault Awareness Program coordinator Amanda Childress said that this survey will provide holistic, accurate data around student experiences.
Childress said that while the College has never implemented a climate survey, it has held surveys concerning sexual assault in the past. She noted that beginning with a randomized trial of the Class of 2017, the College administered the Haven Survey, which collects data on student opinions on sexual assault prior to their matriculation and includes a follow-up survey. The initial survey has a participation rate of around 90 percent and 57 percent for the follow-up survey, she said.
She said that she hopes high student interest and the fact that this is the first climate survey offered by the College will drive up participation. She noted the importance of student perspectives as the College plans to use the data to put into effect “some major and critical changes.”
Lindkvist said the survey would be held at regular intervals, most likely every other year. As a campus under federal investigation for Title IX policy violations, the College is required to conduct such a climate survey.
The AAU survey was one of two proposed surveys in the “Moving Dartmouth Forward” plan. The other proposed survey, the National Health Assessment climate survey, will be held every other year beginning in the fall of 2015.
Fagin is a former member of the Dartmouth staff.
