New York state authorities are working to increase public safety on college campuses.
State officials say the vast majority of sexual and gender-based violence goes unreported at New York’s higher education institutions.
A discussion at State Police headquarters in Albany Wednesday focused on the role of campus safety organizations in preventing rapes, assaults, stalking, and other crime, and supporting victims. Kelli Nicholas Owens is Executive Director of the New York state Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence.
“All of the systems that interact with a survivor or victim of domestic violence, have three pillars in what and how they approach it, that it's survivor centered, meaning the survivors in the driver's seat, on how we respond, that it's trauma informed, and that it's culturally responsive, and that we look at we can't just take that one incident, because there's historical trauma,” Owens said.
In addition to being the only state with a cabinet-level position for domestic violence prevention, New York also recognizes April as Sexual Assault Prevention Month.
State Police Superintendent James Bruen says sexual violence is a serious challenge facing colleges and universities across the state. He says most cases are not reported to police.
“I took the liberty to review some text statistics, which indicate one in five women and one in 16 men were sexually assaulted while going to college. It's estimated that 80 percent of sexual assaults on college campuses go unreported,” Bruen said.
Meghan Malone is a Gender Violence Prevention Specialist with the state Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence. She says language is key and says many survivors don’t feel that they’re victims.
She says responders need to be able to understand the victim's perspective.
“On the other side of that is abusive partner, individual. There may be victims that are kind of off-put by hearing the words ‘abuser,’ ‘perpetrator,’ possibly their ex-partners, current partners, being called those things can be scary, off-putting, so just listening to how they are referring to that person,” Malone said.
Former NFL and Syracuse University quarterback Don McPherson is working with the state on a project called Aspire New York.
McPherson wants to change how sexual assault and violence is talked about on campus. While a vast majority of gender-based violence is perpetrated by men, McPherson says heaping blame with labels like “toxic masculinity” does nothing to help.
“It is the silence of men that as has allowed that term to characterize a generation of boys who've only heard their identity discussed in terms of being toxic. And I always remind people before we use toxic to talk about masculinity or relationships, we most often use toxic to talk about waste,” McPherson said.
Instead, McPherson teaches what he calls ‘aspirational masculinity.’
“We need to reach them with a message that talks about not just prevention of violent crime or sexual crimes, but the promotion of what it means to be a healthy and whole person in a civil and just and peaceful society,” McPherson said.
Campus police officers agree. Caitlin Clark is an Investigator with the State University of New York at Morrisville, in central Madison County.
“You'd be shocked as how we actually do have a lot of similar incidents compared to larger campuses. It's just, I don't- I think we have to be more creative, being a smaller college with our resources and getting our students what they may need,” Clark said.
Clark says her department needs more of three things: state support, officers, and training.
“I want to train more to than just the bare minimum. We train to minimum like, our standards are minimum standards, and I would love to see the support to get us more than more training and continuous training,” Clark said.
The Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence recommends anyone experiencing sexual or gender-based violence to seek medical attention, even if they feel they are not injured. The state's Domestic and Sexual Violence Hotline is 1-800-942-6906.
