Student organizers and College experts hailed this year’s Sexual Assault Awareness Month as a success, saying that it reached a broader audience thanks to more diverse programming.
New to Sexual Assault Awareness Month this year was the student-created “Still I Rise” show put on by WISE @ Dartmouth, which features performances of student-submitted poetry, prose, songs and dance related to surviving sexual assault or sexual violence. Sexual Assault Awareness Program coordinator Amanda Childress said the event was very well-attended.
Caeli Cavanagh ’14, who directed the performance, said that in organizing the event she aspired to create something different from survivor speak-outs, which she said are important but often attract a very specific crowd.
“We thought by focusing on artistic expression, the emphasis would be more on survival and the strength of survivors,” Cavanagh said. “We got a broader audience and we’re really happy about that.”
Cavanagh said that she hopes the event will continue in future years, though its continuation is largely contingent on securing funding.
“It was a really powerful experience, and we’re really glad we got the chance to pull it off,” Cavanagh said.
College survivor advocate Benjamin Bradley said the event was extremely moving and powerful, adding that he was encouraged by high attendance.
Also new to programming this year was the Hopkins Center’s screening of two critically acclaimed films. “The Hunting Ground” (2015) and “S#x Acts” (2012) both centered around sexual assault and covered different perspectives on the issue, Childress said. Both films were followed by discussion panels, which Childress said were also successful.
The screening of “The Hunting Ground,” which focused on sexual assault on college campuses, was better attended, most likely due to the national media coverage that the film received, Childress said.
Hundreds of students attended the film screening in Spaulding Auditorium, though the panel afterwards was less popular, Bradley said. Bradley said “The Hunting Ground” and the subsequent panel were particularly powerful events due to the film’s focus on a range of survivors’ experiences at colleges nationwide, as well as its examination of colleges’ responses and student judicial processes.
“S#x Acts,” an Israeli film, centered on acts of coercion, manipulation and other predatory behaviors leading to sexual violence in a high school setting.
“It showed some very clear processes in how someone uses manipulation and uses coercion to really set up the act,” Childress said. “It was a very real look, and very detailed look, at sexual violence at this age level.”
A workshop titled “How to Help a Friend” was also offered as part of the month’s events and will likely continue to be offered in the future, Bradley said. The event, which provided advice on how to help a friend who has been sexually assaulted, was poorly attended, he said, citing inopportune timing as a probable factor.
“We’re going to try to do a better job letting people know that it’s available, and maybe having it on a more regular basis so people can go,” Bradley said.
The workshop has the potential to be very helpful, Bradley said, because it involves student Sexual Assault Peer Advisors and is a very low-intensity event.
“So many of us know friends, family and people who have been affected by this, but it can be a really difficult thing to know what to do and what to say,” Bradley said. “So having that conversation in a safe space will be really helpful for folks in the future.”
This year’s programming also included the annual Take Back the Night rally. Bradley said some of the more poignant aspects of the rally included the student speakers and the time allotted for participants to discuss their emotions surrounding sexual assault.
Though Dartmouth On Purpose’s “Sex on Purpose” event happened to fall within Sexual Assault Awareness Month, it was not a part of the month’s official programming. “Sex on Purpose” focused more on communication, positive sexual interactions and sexual pleasure, Childress said, as opposed to sexual violence. Childress clarified that most sexual assaults have nothing to do with communication or lack thereof. She said that most assaults are not acts of sex but rather acts of violence.
“There are some similarities and a lot of people put healthy sexual acts and healthy sexual relationships as a kind of precursor to a sexual assault, but there are very different elements in nature,” Childress said. “While from a societal standpoint they share the same terms, one is an act of love and connection and passion while the other is an act of violence, an independent act.”
The message behind “Sex on Purpose” is still an important one in regards to sexual assault, Childress said, because establishing healthy relationships and communication as the norm is essential in changing the culture surrounding sexual assault and setting standards for what bystanders in the community should or should not tolerate.
The AAU sexual assault climate survey was also conducted as part of the awareness month, Childress said. Title IX coordinator and Clery Act compliance officer Heather Lindkvist did not respond to requests for comment by press time.
In the future, Childress said she hopes to coordinate more with Lindkvist, graduate students, faculty and staff to extend the events and programming to all of campus, instead of focusing primarily on undergraduate students. This month featured some events that were opened to the broader community, including the film screenings, a workshop specifically for faculty and staff that addressed how to better respond to survivors and Denim Day, held on April 24, during which participants wore denim in support for victims of sexual violence, Childress said.
“We’d like to make this more of a collaborative effort,” she said.
Bradley said that a particular strength of this year’s Sexual Assault Awareness Month is that it no longer centers around only one event, the Take Back the Night rally.
“We’re now having a few different avenues for survivors to talk and for these issues to really come to light and for the community to participate,” Bradley said. “There are also a lot of avenues for people to get involved. Students have done a great job building awareness around this issue, and we’re really headed in a great direction.”
