Campus team to focus on sexual assault awareness

Nearly 20 people from many Grand Valley offices and community organizations met May 4 to begin the transformative work of raising awareness among students about sexual assault, dating and domestic violence, and stalking to help reduce the number of such incidents on campus.

The Campus Violence Prevention Team is among the tangible results from a grant the Women's Center received in January from the U.S. Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women. Bart Merkle, dean of students and vice provost for Student Affairs, said having the team in place represents a "real opportunity for Grand Valley and the broader community."

Merkle said he hopes the three-year, $265,129 grant will have impact not only in reducing the number of assaults and stalking incidents on campus, but also in providing students with a better understanding of how violence impacts their communities.

Theresa Rowland, grant coordinator, said CVPT meetings will continue over the summer and the next three years with shared goals in mind. "As part of this grant, we will connect with all incoming students in terms of increasing educational programming and training sessions," she said. The grant also allows for expanding partnerships with nonprofit organizations.

Marlene Kowalski-Braun, director of the Women's Center, said she and others applied for the grant because they recognized a great disconnect between the number of students who informally share their experiences with violence and the number of students who actually file a formal complaint.

Rowland then relayed a 2006 statistic that one in five Grand Valley women students said that they had been a victim of sexual assault during their lifetimes.