Brittany Kurtz Source 3

A. It's obvious that sexual assault on campus is an issue- but how exactly can the university take a stronger lead on preventing it?
B. Richardson, Bradford, and Jon A. Shields. "The Real Campus Sexual Assault Problem- And How to Fix It." Academic Search Complete [EBSCO]. N.p., Oct. 2015. Web.

        After revising and simplifying my search while doing research, I finally found a helpful piece of work. Up until now, I had been spending far too much time trying to do far too much. My process was too complicated, my thesis too broad. Instead of working to identify factors that contribute to sexual assault on campus, I've now morphed my focus towards assessing how universities are addressing sexual assault and if they're successful in doing so. From there, I can synthesize a contribution to the conversation. To begin this process, I simplified my search to the bare minimum: "campus sexual assault". Lo and behold, the first article to appear was the exact one I'd been searching for this whole time. Real Campus Sexual Assault aimed to pinpoint implemented structures at different universities to determine assault rates at aforementioned universities, focusing specifically on students who lived on-campus. It discovered that campuses with stricter regulations such as those regarding 'dry' campuses, curfews, and overnight visitors reported lower assault rates than those that did not strictly regulate any or all of those social factors. The authors go forward to argue that "social limits and limits on alcohol" are the way to go if universities truly want to address the 'rape culture' that seems to thrive on their campuses. They explain that allowing students such unbridled freedom, especially so early on in their newly found 'adulthood', sacrifices student safety (on more than just the sexual level) in the name of sexual revolution.

        This article contains the information that I had been hoping to find. I'm relieved to know that some research has been done that reveals the impact that certain factors have on sexual assault. It's interesting to note that in the first articles I read, nothing was said about the role that social regulations play in this situation. They focused on the role of the university as: 1) an educator, failing to educate students on what constitutes sexual assault and 2) a protector of students, failing to protect students from threats within school grounds. This is a new perspective on the issue. No matter where they're coming from, however, all three article say something in common: the school system is failing its students. But how can it improve?

        Perhaps the university does need to focus more proactively on prevention rather than education; after all, the majority of rapists and sexual assault perpetrators display antisocial and narcissistic personalities (29) -- education won't easily change that. In addition, alcohol plays such a huge role in college sexual assaults. As many as 76% of college rapists confess to using alcohol to intoxicate their victim (29). Enforcing social rules, even if they do seem unfairly conservative or anti-progressive, would certainly help to combat that last statistic by removing students from potentially unsafe environments. To address the topic of education/prevention: perhaps educating students on the role one can have as a bystander could be of use? Educating both men and women on how sexual assault is defined, as well as on how to prevent this crime from being committed against oneself or those around would also be beneficial.