Three student leaders appeared before the Student Union Senate on Wednesday, citing the need for greater preventative measures against sexual and relationship violence.

Presenters Jeff Zove, Jay Beerman and Kristi Nigh hoped that senators would sign on to a resolution supporting the creation of an Office for the Prevention of Sexual and Relationship Violence that would coordinate prevention and education efforts across campus.

“The University has been very good about risk reduction, but it is not a substitute for prevention,” said senior Jay Beerman, co-president of One in Four, the all-male rape education group. “Prevention is educating students and working to stop incidents of sexual assault and relationship violence.”

The presentation highlighted the need for greater preventative education in addition to measures such as distributing rape whistles and improving lighting on paths, both of which are considered methods of risk reduction. They called for a new Sexual Assault Coordinator, which would develop protocol for campus-wide responses to emergencies, essentially centralizing the University’s response towards rape on campus.

According to the presenters, Washington University is on par with the national averages for incident of rape or attempted rape; nationally, one in four women are survivors of rape or attempted rate.

“Relationship violence does happen on this campus, but this is a problem that we can solve,” said Beerman.

A coordinator of sexual and relationship violence would supervise the programming efforts of current student groups, work to create campus protocols regarding the response to incidents of sexual violence, and coordinate the committee on sexual assault.

“Creating an office and hiring a full time staff member to coordinate all the preventative education efforts and programs on campus is common practice in higher education,” said Craig Woodsmall, a psychologist with Student Health and Counseling Services and advisor to One in Four. “We’re at the point where we could really benefit from someone to oversee and review our initiatives.”

Discussion of the coordinator’s position suggests that it would be, to some extent, independent from the administration and located in the Office of Student Affairs.

According to the presenters, the ideal candidate would be one with some combination of experience with administrative work in higher education and an understanding of mental health and victim advocacy.

During the debate, senators received the proposition extremely favorably, accepting the need for this position and its importance.

“The idea was thrown around that Student Union could help with some funding. That’s extremely important because we’re putting our money where our mouth is,” stated senior Jeff Zove, former speaker of SU Senate.

Pledging funding would be an important step towards showing the seriousness of SU in dealing with this issue.

“It is really important that this be supported by students,” said Woodsmall. “It doesn’t make sense to create new departments if it won’t have the support of the student body and Student Union.”

At a future meeting, the Senate will decide whether or not to approve a resolution endorsing this plan.

Students involved were hopeful that, with the Senate’s approval, they would be able to convince the administration that this is a worthwhile project to undertake.

“The reason Student Union has taken this on is because this administration has been very good about responding to student initiatives in the past,” said Zove. “I’m hoping that the administration will continue that trend on this issue.”

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