OT: UConn's high annual reported rapes: good news or bad?

[maddoggy]

The number of rapes is, obviously bad. But the school says the high number of reports means students feel comfortable reporting it.

A Washington Post story online at These colleges have the most reports of rape says nearly 100 schools had at least 10 reports of rape on their main campuses in 2014, with Brown University (9,200 students) and UConn (26,500) tied for the highest annual total — 43 each.

Adjusted to reports per student, neither school is in or near the top 10, however: Brown is 4.7 per thousand and UConn is 1.6. The highest rate per thousand students, 12.8 is at Reed College.

The Post says victim advocates consider the higher figures to be a good thing because they suggest victims "are stepping forward to tell authorities about incidents that in years past might have gone unreported."

It isn't clear if all schools use the same criteria. For example, some might limit reports to on-campus incidents or to incidents reported by students.

 

[Wally East]

What's needed is full-reporting or as close to that as possible. In that vein, Baylor's 4 reported cases is damning and highlights the problems the school has had in that regard.

Getting 100% reporting, or close to it, is difficult and starting to (apparently) make progress toward that is good news about bad news.


(Well, obviously, what's needed is for sexual assault to never happen.)

 

[Fairfield Fan]

A jump in reported rapes is not necessarily "bad news," though that is an odd way to characterize it. As Professor Caroline Heldman of my alma mater, Occidental College, has said, an increase in reported assaults can mean that women are more confident that their assaults will be handled responsibly. Professor Heldman is a leader in the fight to eliminate campus sexual assaults and for accountability by college administrations.

But having said that, it is shocking and dismaying that so many young women are being assaulted on campus. Occidental College is being sued for violation of Title IX by dozens of women and faculty. The fact that one in five women reports being sexually assaulted on campus during their years in college is utterly horrific.

I suppose the nexus of the sexual assault debate and this website is that here we celebrate the accomplishments of women, and support the expansion of women in professional sports as well as in national intercollegiate sports. But too often, it is intercollegiate male athletes who are committing these rapes. In the case at Stanford, it was a varsity swimmer. Another report found that half of all campus sexual assaults were carried out by either intercollegiate athletes, or students who engage in intramural sports on campus.

In any event, women are being victimized and college administrations are responding only slowly and under fire from activists.

 

[connboy77]

How could this possibly be good news? This type of negative news may give parents a legit reason for advising their daughter's not to attend UCONN.

 

[Fairfield Fan]

Read carefully, and you find that UConn's rate of rape per 1,000 students is 1.6. That is relatively low compared with other colleges and universities. Indeed, it compares with Dartmouth's 6.7 per 1,000 and 4.8 for Brown University. But any number should cause parents to demand protection, and justice for women who are raped. The general assembly passed legislation last year putting in strict reporting requirements, as well as definitions of sexual assault that make clear what is a crime.

That is positive, though there is far more that needs to improve.

 

[wire chief]

Years ago my daughter was at Rutgers and working on the school newspaper. Sometimes she toiled late at night, and she told me that one way of handling safety there was she could always get a security escort to accompany her from office to car.

 

[BIGMAC]

I would like to remind people that men are sexually assaulted and raped and that they need the same protection and justice. I do realize that in the majority of the cases , women are the victims and men the perpetrators. To discredit one victim , you do a disservice to all of them.

 

[bags27]

Read carefully, and you find that UConn's rate of rape per 1,000 students is 1.6. That is relatively low compared with other colleges and universities.

Is it the rate of rape or the rate of reporting rape? After all, it seems that Baylor women were telling administrators of the crime, but the administrators suppressed that knowledge. Schools with low incidence of reporting crime aren't necessarily safer--it may be quite the opposite.

 

[Fairfield Fan]

I would like to remind people that men are sexually assaulted and raped and that they need the same protection and justice. I do realize that in the majority of the cases , women are the victims and men the perpetrators. To discredit one victim , you do a disservice to all of them.

You are correct. Completely agree with you. Thank you for highlighting that very important point. Men are victimized on campus, and also in the military. And their cases are treated with the same dismissive attitude as are those of women.

 

[Fairfield Fan]

Is it the rate of rape or the rate of reporting rape? After all, it seems that Baylor women were telling administrators of the crime, but the administrators suppressed that knowledge. Schools with low incidence of reporting crime aren't necessarily safer--it may be quite the opposite.

You are correct that it is the rate of "reported" sexual assault. As Professor Heldman has written, an increase in reported assaults can mean that women and men who are victimized feel more confident in coming forward because they believe their claims will be handled responsibly, as will they. But you are right that the virtual absence of reported assaults at Baylor could mean that victims believe that they will be victimized a second time by the administration itself. A similar point was made regarding reporting of sexual assault at Brigham Young University in Utah, a Mormon institution that forbids premarital sex.

 

[UcMiami]

I think the truly shocking number is that one in five sexual assault number - that is what you get when you ask the question anonymously in a poll and represents a 4 year aggregate - so at best 1 in 20 each and every year. Now, when you go by actual reports by schools, the number is much much lower at almost every school - so there is a huge disconnect between the reality that women are experiencing and the number that is officially recorded.

Any school, and Baylor is a prime example, that is reporting ridiculously low numbers is lying, or is so badly intimidating their female student population into not reporting assaults and rapes as to be criminally complicit.

 

[KnightBridgeAZ]

I've never studied this issue, but when discussing the 20% number, I doubt it means 20% have been attacked the way we generally think of a rape "on the street", where a police presence or what-have-you could make a campus safer. I suspect a lot of the rapes are among either acquaintances or in party environments where I think it is only by the changing of (mostly) guy's attitudes and the awareness by (mostly) females of potential threatening situations that can make a difference.

 

[cbraarj]

What happened after the reported assaults is the only thing that matters here!

 

[vtcwbuff]

A reported rape isn't necessarily rape. I have been involved in a couple of "rape" cases. Once as an enlisted member of a general court martial and once as a witness. Neither were what they seemed. Both involved alcohol which seems to be a common element in college rape accusations.

My point being that a reported rape does not mean that a rape actually occurred. The only thing that counts is how the report is handled. IMO any report of a crime as serious as rape should be immediately referred to local police authorities not campus cops or some agenda driven university entity. The university should do nothing (and have nothing to do with the investigation) until a determination is made if a rape actually occurred.