On college campuses nationwide, the issue of sexual assault against women is growing in numbers each day and even more drastically each year. In 2014, it was reported from the Department of Justice included in RAINN that “11.2% of all students experience rape or sexual assault through physical force, violence, or incapacitation” in their college experience. The 11.2 percentage only make up the victims that reported sexual assaults or threats of sexual assault. There is a portion of victims that never report their assaults. Since the victims do not report the incident, the perpetrator is set to roam free with no punishment. It is an endless and vicious cycle that society goes through. The cycle needs to be brought to an end. Education and counseling …show more content…
Magazine published an article titled “Rape is Rape” and reported that “At least 1 in 5 women will experience a rape or an attempted rape at some point during college, and 90 percent of these rapes will be perpetrated by acquaintances”. That is twenty percent of women that will experience rape or sexual assault. Experiencing an incident of assault, let alone sexaul assault can have many devastating impacts on the victims. Mental health impacts can last a lifetime and can include depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder. There is also a plethora of emotional and psychological impacts that it will have on the victims. Women reported to the Feminist Majority Foundation from ENotes that they "often feel emotionally and psychologically coerced into sex.” Not only is their bodies being taken advantage of but also their …show more content…
First, college campuses need a surplus of authority figures such as security guards and police officers. This will allow the campus to be supervised and give many students peace of mind while on campus. Secondly, college administration needs to initiate bystander intervention programs. It can be a community watch where students and staff look out for one another. Also, if the community witnesses a threat of sexual assault, they can step in and provide help for the victim. Finally, the main resource that needs to be initiated by college administration is education. Education for the students, but also for the staff and faculty. These educational programs would include information on many different action plans and resources for victims and non-victims. Colleges initiating these examples could have an enormous impact on how students and staff are understanding and handling sexaul
About 25% of females will encounter a pursued rape or will be raped during her college experience and
Right after the attack, individuals experience a sense of shock, which has a powerful effect on their emotions and reactions. They go in an emotional state from being confused as they are unable to recognize and accept on what just happened. Victims will ask themselves “why me?”, and find that it will takes a lot of time to re-adjust after. The physical, mental, and spiritual pain can pervade the everyday lives of the survivors. Many college students that go through short- term effects, can prolong into long-term, depending how affective the sexual assault was. Some of these individuals will develop depression, or even post-traumatic stress disorder. Victims may engage in heavy drinking or even abuse drugs to get over their overwhelming feelings, but that can just cause more issues for them in the future. Colleges should be more involved in helping out the survivors of rape. Getting a deep understanding on how difficult this experience is, there should be more help in guiding to heal each individuals path for the better. College initially puts a lot of pressure on students and this experience will only increase their anxiety and
Rape is currently on the rise on American college campuses and it is the most common committed crime among college students today. In their time in college 1 out of every 5 women and 1 out of every 71 men will experience some form of sexual harassment as reported by the National Sexual Violence Resource Center. These numbers are growing each year and have raised a lot of concern in the administrative level of higher education institutions. In an effort to try and prevent these occurrences universities have begun to implement mandatory curriculum to educate students on the subject and have even begun to hold campus wide events and create clubs to spread awareness and show support because of the repetitive nature of this crime. While it is good
When it comes to sexual assault on college campuses there is also the question of what can colleges do to decrease the amount of sexual assaults. Bradford Richardson and Jon A Shields wondered the same thing, so they conducted an ...
“I felt his hands start to move down towards my shorts as if he was trying to unbutton them or pull them off. I was still crying at this point and felt so scared that I couldn’t move” (Henneberger, 2012). These are words written by a college freshman after she had been raped, but they are true for many others as well. According to the Rape Crisis Center of Medina and Summit Counties, “every two minutes someone in the US is sexually assaulted” (Get the Facts). “Girls ages 16-19 are four times more likely than the than the general population to be victims of sexual assault” (Get the Facts). These women may be described as slut, cheap, or ready for action, rather than victim, sufferer, or survivor. Rape myths encourage these demeaning terms for women and conceal the reality of rape culture. I will describe the pervasiveness of sexual assault on college campuses as well as the systems and procedures in place to address it. Power plays a role in this issue, including the powerful men on campus such as athletes and fraternity members as well as the administrators in power who regulate the punishments and actions that are taken against the perpetrators. The influence of those in power often goes overlooked in our society because it has become so intertwined with our culture.
With one in five college students experiencing sexual assault during their college career who wouldn’t be afraid? This remains especially true for young women between the ages of 18-24 (“The Realities of Sexual Assault”). While a woman’s freshman and sophomore year of college are when she is at a most risk for assault, it can happen at any time. According to Robin Gray in the article on sexual assault statistics, “between 20% and 25% of women will experience a completed and/or attempted rape during their college career,” (Gray). At Northwest Missouri State University for the 2016-2017 academic year there are 5,618 undergraduate students enrolled. With the ratio of male to female students being 44% to 56%, there are about 3,147 female students. In terms of the statistics estimated by Gray, 630-787 of the female student population at Northwest Missouri State will experience rape during their college career (“Northwest Missouri State University”). This is a disturbingly large figure. Women are not the only ones susceptible to these acts, but men are too. It is said about “10%” of all sexual assault cases involve male victims (“The Realities of Sexual Assault”). While this number is slightly lower for men it is often believed that male victims of sexual assault do not often report their crime due to the social stigma surrounding their assault. Men may feel
A. Background Information: The next four years of the students’ lives after high school mark the moment they become independent. Because of the freedom, college students are more susceptible to careless actions like drinking, doing drugs, and even committing sexualt assualt. Sexual assault has been around for years and the actions to prevent this heinous crime has been minimal, especially in colleges and universities. In 2015, Brock Turner, a student from Stanford, sexually assaulted a young woman on campus. Turner claimed that because he was drinking, was with friends, and saw a “promiscuous” female student, that pressured him into committing such a heinous crime. This was because Stanford University didn’t teach its students sexual assault prevention which caused the victim to be harm and violated. By teaching college students about sexual assault prevention, it decreases the number of sexual assault cases on campus, prevents psychological damage to the victim’s mental state, and educates other students to know the signs
Have you ever been encountered in a circumstance of being raped or knew an individual that was a victim of rape? Every one-hundred and seven seconds an American is sexually assaulted (RAINN). Rape has become a continuous problem causing controversy due to the way colleges cover up or simply hide incidents of rape throughout campus. More college students are also being raped by their own acquaintances rather than random strangers. Students, parents, and politicians question the way schools protect students and how their campuses can become more effective and efficient in preventing further occurrences of rape. Over the past years there has been a series of incidents where rape has been an extreme problem on college campuses in America that have been kept quiet until something traumatic happens. The prevalence of rapes on college campuses is continuing to rise due to lack of security, surveillance and awareness.
According to Kathleen Hirsch, the author of “Fraternities of Fear: Gang Rape, Male Bonding, and the Silencing of Women” 1 in every 4 women attending college will be the victim of sexual assault at some point during her academic career. Or in another study reported in the “The sexual Victimization of College Women” there are 35.3 incidents of sexual assault in a group of 1,000 women in a time span of 6.91 months (Statistics). Obviously sexual assault is a huge problem that should be taken very seriously. Some colleges have wonderful programs put in place that provides great services to help those students who have been have been sexually assaulted and programs that help education and prevent sexual assault.
To date, “between 10 to 40 percent of female students [. . .] have been raped while [. . .] up to 60 percent of males students [have] commit[ed] actions that meet the legal definition of sexual assault” (Bretz 19). This percentage demonstrates the ineffectiveness of university policies and signifies a drastic change to procedures is in order if educational institutions want to see improvement. In order to see an effective change, policies must “explicitly define key terms such as “‘consent’, ‘force’ [,]‘incapacity’ and cover [a] range of sexually violent behavior” (Gunraj 9). Furthermore, since the age of fourteen 58.7% of females “ha[ve] experienced one or more forms of victimization[. . .] 35.0% ha[ve] experienced at least one completed or attempted rape and 23.5% ha[ve] been raped” (Senn et. al. Results). First-year female students are not prepared for the perpetrators they will face on campus, and as a result, are more vulnerable to sexual violence. Universities need to develop effective policies and procedures to not only prepare women for the challenges they may face but to reduce the overall number of sexual assaults and make school a safer environment for
The faces flash by on the computer screen. The women on the screen are differents shapes, sizes, ages, and colors. However, there is one thing that all the women have in common: they have all been sexually assaulted on a college campus. More than one in five women were sexually assaulted on college campuses (Mott, Par. 1). It has been proven that programs in schools can help prevent these statistics from growing. However, more needs to be done to prevent sexual assault on educational facilities because the current programs are not fulfilling their purpose.
The amount of rape and abuse cases according to statistics is at an unacceptable high. At least 1 in 4 women will experience sexual assault during their years in college (Sexual Assault and College Campuses – Statistics). In many instances the incident is a result from alcohol intoxication. According to Sara Lawrence College at least 50% of sexual assault cases include alcohol (Sexual Assault and College Campuses – Statistics). Administration from all over must come together to put an end to senseless abuse.
According to a statement addressing the sexual victimization of college women The Crime and Victimization in America states that, “ One out of four women will be sexually assaulted on a college campus.” This disturbing fact has not minimized throughout the years, instead it is continuing to worsen throughout college campuses. Sexual assault is not an act to be taken lightly. Society must stop pinpointing the individuals who commit these crimes one by one, but rather look at the problem as a whole and begin to understand the main cause of sexual assault and possible methods to reduce these acts of sexual coercion.
Sexual assault is a problem that affects many students in colleges. Sexual assault is defined as “any unwanted contact” (6) performed on “an unwilling victim, without consent” (2). This means anything from touching to completed rape. Without consent means that “vigorous efforts were made to avoid sexual contact” (2). Physical symptoms of sexual assault can tamper with the victim’s quality of life. It can be pelvic pain, migraines, and even disability that can prevent a victim from working. There are over 32,000 pregnancies a year that are a result of completed rape, but problems with pregnancy can also be a result of sexual assault. In addition to these effects, women who experience this assault are more likely to contract sexually transmitted diseases (2).
Sexual assault is a social issue that has been a pressing topic of conversation throughout communities in the United States. The rapid interest in sexual assault comes after a string of released content about the prominence and severity of sexual assault against women. The media has chosen increase public awareness on the fact that “one in 5 women and one in 16 men are sexually assaulted while in college” (). Media content on the topic includes the highly-rated documentary “The Hunting Ground” and a report and a call to action from the White House Council on Women and Girls. The public outcry is not only because of the staggering rate of sexual assault rather it is the lack of or mishandled reporting of sexual assaults in college. This paper