Grace Alvarez
Universities are taking initiatives to control sexual assault on campuses. Two ways to combat this crime include providing educational resources for students and ensuring the campus police force promotes prevention tactics and student awareness.
At Towson University, one of the resources for students is SAPE: Sexual assault prevention educators, which creates awareness of sexual assault and how to help prevent it.
They often host events and workshops that “focus around consent, generally just about being a good person,” stated Destiny Varnedoe, a graduate student who worked in SAPE for three years.
Some of the workshops they do are Healthy Relationships, Bystander Intervention, and Supporting Survivors of Sexual Assault, along with Consents How You Get to The Good Part. They cover how to intervene as a bystander, along with how to recognize abuse in relationships.
“A lot of the stuff we do makes sense when you understand the building blocks of consent; it’s really all honestly based around that,” said Varnedoe.
Anyone on campus can utilize SAPE; to learn this information, workshops can even be requested by other groups around campus.
“A lot of health education classes request us to learn about sexual violence prevention. Greek life tends to get us at events as well; resident advisors also utilize us in dorms,” said Elexzene Plain. Plain is a current senior at Towson who is in SAPE.
Towson University Police Department has not requested a workshop from SAPE, nor do they work closely with them often. However, they have been seen at a few events, and they help get the word out about SAPE to the student body.
“Through our interaction with the campus community and our website, TUPD promotes all available trainings and resources,” stated Teri O’Neal, the Associate Vice President of Communications for TU.
TUPD does most of its work with SAPE during the red zone, the first six weeks of the Fall semester. This is when most sexual assaults will occur on campus.
“SAPE is an effective resource to raise awareness and provide education to help prevent sexual violence,” O’Neal stated when explaining why SAPE is important on Towson’s campus.
While the TUPD doesn’t get their education from SAPE, they are trained in other measures when it comes to sexual assault.
“TUPD officers participate in annual Sexual Assault Response Training and Certification through the Maryland Police and Correctional Training Commission,” said O’Neal, “We also send officers to specialized training, including Sexual Assault Investigation Training.”
Some students in SAPE hope to see TUPD at more events to recognize their impact on campus so that they can be utilized and known by even more of the student body at Towson.
“I’d say with the workshops and resources, SAPE is one of the best ways to help our community at Towson,” stated Varnedoe.