The Red Zone
When many college students hear the words “Red Zone”, the first thing that comes to their heads is football. As college students, this should not be the only thing that comes to mind. The “Red Zone” is the beginning of the academic year where women are most at risk for sexual assault. The first six to eight weeks to be exact. The weeks where the frat parties are happening every day. The weeks where freshmen haven’t made friends. The weeks where they’re not familiar with the campus. A study of nine colleges done by the U.S. Justice Department found that over 600 sexual assaults occurred during September and October compared to the 500 assaults over the next four months. These were all reported by first-year students. The problem expands past college. Sexual assaults and related incidents are very common in high school. Over 70% of sexual assault incidents that were reported from K-12 occurred on campus. Over 33% of victims fall in the 13–18 age group (Young, et al. 2019).
To combat sexual assaults and rape on campus, many colleges have mandatory online training for students before class registrations. As someone who has taken these, I can say that they are helpful. However, if these are being held during the first week, how can we say that it’s not too late? According to the National Organization for Women (NOW), many experts believe that these pieces of training need to be adjusted. One alternative is that instead of waiting until the beginning of the school year, schools make it mandatory for prospective students. This means any student wanting to attend a certain college will be required to take the online course. By doing this, any incoming students will be more aware of situations and steps they can take. An alternative to this would be to have these courses in person with other incoming students. Having them in this environment will allow students to have a discussion and be more engaged.
Another training method that experts believe can be helpful is bystander intervention training. Bystander intervention is when someone who isn’t involved in the situation jumps in to help and change the outcome. The American Journal of Preventive Medicine did a study to see how effective bystander training was. At the three colleges that were looked at, the study found that the college with bystander training had 17% fewer cases when it came to interpersonal communication compared to two other colleges. According to RAINN, people are always hesitant to step in despite knowing that it may be the right thing to do. Many reasons they are hesitant is because they don’t know what to say, it’s not their business and the most common reason is they believe someone else will step in. Bystander training has proven to be successful. The National Sexual Violence Resource Center (NSVRC) created some tips to help people when it comes to intervening. The first tip is to disrupt the situation. Distracting the harasser or pretending to know the person being harrassed are simple ways to step in. Other tips include confronting the harasser, understanding your privilege, intervening with friends, and supporting the person being harassed.
The final suggestion would be to extend sexual assault training so it includes K-12. This means that students will get age-appropriate training when it comes to sexual assault and related topics. An article by Edu Risk outlines how these courses can be spread out through a kid’s K-12 years. K-5 can focus on consent in general, as well as bodily autonomy. 6th grade through 8th grade will focus more on relationships since this is around the time that most students begin to date. Consent is still a focus but now it more mentioned in terms of sexual activity. Education from 9th through 12th is expanded on to include stalking, sexual violence, sexual misconduct, and how to report incidents.
Sexual assault on college campuses will always be a difficult subject to tackle. By educating students at a younger age, we will be able to see changes in the future. Simple methods like the bystander intervention course can be very cost-effective and done in large groups, making it very efficient. By making it a requirement for prospective students to take online courses and take part in discussions, they’ll be able to gain a better understanding while remaining engaged.
