By Nicole Montero/Staff Writer
President Barack Obama announced a White House Task Force that has three months to determine the best ways for colleges and universities to deal with sex crimes on campus.
For FIU, this could mean a stronger Victim Empowerment Program and even curriculum changes.
Whitney Bauman is an assistant professor for the Department of Religious Studies and also part of Women’s Studies. he says that, while the task force is a good start, a curriculum change is at the core of addressing not only campus sex crimes, but also the culture of sex violence as a whole.
“This is a major epidemic,” Bauman said. “And although it has gotten better over time, it’s still not enough. The task force is a great step in the right direction, but we still need to do more.”
“This is a major epidemic,” Bauman said. “And although it has gotten better over time, it’s still not enough. The task force is a great step in the right direction, but we still need to do more.”
He noted that one in five women will experience sexual assault on a college campus.
And according to the Florida Council Against Sexual Violence, most sexual assaults occur before the age of 25.
While the University has its Victim Empowerment Program that provides confidential assistance to anyone who has been victimized, Bauman thinks there is more that can be done.
“We live in this sort of ‘assault culture’ — some might even call it ‘rape culture’ — that comes from a deep root of sexism in our societies,” he said.
Bauman pointed to gender inequality in presidential campaigns, comparing people’s attention to Hillary Clinton’s address on women’s issues while President Obama’s address on men’s issues is viewed as a norm.
“It’s this sort of imbalance that needs to be addressed and I think that learning about it helps to see where we are on the spectrum,” Bauman said. “Just like students have a global learning requirement, they should have a requirement to take something on gender or race — just one course that introduces people to the imbalance of things like gender and sex.”
Stephanie Olayon, a sophomore majoring in psychology, questions whether or not the task force will work.
“I hope that the task force works, especially for FIU,” Olayon said. “But the truth of the matter is that I’m not sure that any amount of learning will be enough to stop the people who do these kinds of terrible things.”
Bauman emphasized the importance of students being sensitive about inequality and sexual issues, and proposed that students demand curricular changes so that they may be more aware of the sexual and gender issues going on around them.
Cynthia Rodriguez, a sophomore majoring in health service administration, agreed with Bauman’s idea of a sex and gender course requirement for the core curriculum.
“It’s terrible that these assaults happen everyday,” Rodriguez said. “It’s all around us and we don’t even know about it. I think that being more aware about things going on in our society is extremely important.”
Bauman said if the University is going to be “Worlds Ahead,” then the community needs to be sensitive to these issues and learn about them.
[pullquote]“It’s terrible that these assaults happen everyday,” Rodriguez said. “It’s all around us and we don’t even know about it. I think that being more aware about things going on in our society is extremely important.”[/pullquote]
“I think that this task force will suggest curriculum changes for FIU,” he said. “Hopefully, it helps us with the funding so that we could address this sort of thing.”
The new task force will include efforts from Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, amidst other federal departmental heads. The team will have three months to submit reports on how federal government officials can better combat sexual assault on campuses.
“We won’t really know if this will be effective or not, but my hunch is that it will,” Bauman said.
He said a national focus on issues of sexual assaults is essential for change on campuses.
“Sex without consent? Ain’t nobody got time for that,” Bauman said. “We can’t start making change until we have some idea of how bad the problem is.”
-news@fiusm.com
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