The Official Student Newspaper of Eckerd College
Volume 7, Issue III Oct. 23, 2015
Shifting c u lt u r e away f ro m a ss au lt
Shannon Collins and the Office for Advocacy and Gender Justice are working to create a culture at Eckerd where sexual assault is not tolerated. By Emma Cotton Editor-in-chief
photos by Cypress Hansen Students and faculty share their opinions about gun safety on college campuses.
Gun control: A new era
By Ben Goldberg Opinion Editor
October started with three school shootings in nine days. The Umpqua Community College shooting on Oct. 1 left 10 dead and more wounded. The Northern Arizona University shooting on Oct. 9 left one dead and more wounded. The Texas Southern University shooting on the same day left another dead and another wounded. “More Americans have died from guns in the United States since 1968 than on
battlefields of all the wars in American history,” Dean of Students and Professor of Psychology Marjorie Sanfilippo said, quoting a statistic from New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof earlier this year. Sanfilippo stands at the forefront of a movement that has arisen to try to prevent the legalization of open carry policy on college campuses. Such legislation would allow students, faculty, security and visitors to carry non concealed firearms on public campuses. The proposed bill is not yet up for a vote, but the po-
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Nearly 20 years ago, Shannon Collins drove to the local hospital in South Carolina on her first case as an advocate for survivors of sexual assault. She was nervous. Her client — a seven-year-old girl — was molested by a family friend during routine after-school visits. Collins entered the hospital, where nurses directed her to the child’s room. The girl sat on her hospital bed, greeting Collins politely before continuing to stare up at the TV on the wall, where her cartoons were playing. Collins turned to the girl’s family, explaining her role as an advocate. In the coming years, she would defend and stand up for these children and adults, as a lawyer would a client. Unlike the legal professionals that her clients would meet, Collins was not concerned with proving how, when and where the assault took place. She would support her clients emotionally, find any necessary resources that they needed and even help with paperwork. Her job, she explained, was to take the side of the survivor. After a while, the doctor entered. He told the girl to sit like a frog so that he could check her for injuries and collect samples for evidence. When he finished, he asked if she had any questions. The girl nodded. “Why did he do this to me?” she asked. The four adults in the room were silent. Even after decades of life experience, the question seemed impossible to answer. The doctor told the girl that he didn’t know, but what the man did was wrong, and she didn’t deserve it. “Twenty years later, and I don’t know if she ever found an answer to
that question,” Collins says. Collins wondered what would bring this girl justice. Was justice even possible? What did it mean to advocate for her? In her time as an advocate, Collins has witnessed first-hand the heinous nature of assault. Though she has seen many survivors heal and transform successfully, she recognizes that the initial shock can be devastating. “Your sexuality is such a central part of your total being,” she says. “And when someone takes control of your physical body — your physical body and your essence and just takes that away from you — it feels like you have no power in the world. Who are you after that?” As the director of the new Office for Advocacy and Gender Justice and the confidential advocate on campus, Collins now tries to bring justice to sexual assault survivors at Eckerd. President Eastman appointed Collins to lead the Office for Advocacy and Gender Justice last March. The decision to create the office was sparked by increased campus consciousness about sexual assault that resulted from the President’s forum, held last December. In addition, the Campus SaVE Act, an expansion of the Clery Act, went into effect in July of 2015. It requires campuses nationwide to respond to sexual assault proactively. “This office really wasn’t developed only to ensure compliance,” Collins says. “That’s certainly important, but I think there’s a real momentum and a real community desire to confront this issue directly.” Eckerd’s Campus Security Report, released on Oct. 1 in accordance with the Clery Act, reported 12 forcible acts of sexual assault — the highest number of cases at Eckerd from data that begins in 2009. Data is taken in calendar years, not
school years. Prior to 2014, the highest number of cases reported was five. Collins expected an increase in reporting this past year, and notes that the climb in numbers can be positive. She suggests that the number of people who feel empowered to report has changed, not the actual assaults. “The more education you do, the more outreach you do, the more we can expect the reports go up,” she says. Though this most recent report was based on data collected before Collins came into office, the high numbers may reflect the national conversation about sexual assault or the appointment of Lorisa Lorenzo to the Title IX office last year. With the data in mind, Collins will go forward by attempting to create an on-campus culture where both potential victims and bystanders can recognize and stop predatory behavior. Her goal is to tweak social norms so that any unwanted sexual behavior is rejected by the culture on campus. She has approached the college as a system, with the goal of entering each individual branch to educate faculty, staff or student leaders about strategies to prevent and understand sexual assault situations. So far, she has spoken to RAs, Peer Mentors, EC-ERT, counselors, study abroad advisors, admissions counselors and Human Experience faculty and she has more on the agenda. Collins also works with four students who connect her directly to the culture she is trying to change. Junior Clara Suarez-Nugent works as a liaison between ECOS and the Office for Advocacy and Gender Justice.
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See Collins , page 3 The Current is a free, biweekly student newspaper produced at Eckerd College. Opinions expressed in this publication are those of the writers.