The Milanof-Schock Library will host a program about Sexual Assault Awareness on College Campuses on Tuesday, May 17 at 6:00 p.m. The Hunting Ground, a 60-minute documentary about the incidence of sexual assault on college campuses in the US, will be shown with a Q&A discussion afterward, led by an experienced panel. Encouraged to attend this important program is any student – male or female – who plans to attend college or any parent of a college-bound child or of a current college student. The program will be co-sponsored by Penn State Harrisburg.
Presenting the program will be Dale Boyer and Danielle Harvey. Boyer, a longtime resident of the Mount Joy area, is the assistant director of Campus Security at Elizabethtown College who is trained in and certified to teach RAD (Rape Aggression Defense), the largest women’s self-defense program with instructors all across the US, Canada and several countries abroad. As a Campus Security Officer, husband and father, Boyer is passionate about the subject of sexual assault and its prevention.
Harvey is an adult counselor at the YWCA Lancaster Sexual Assault Prevention and Counseling Center, the designated rape crisis center for Lancaster County. She has counseled for the YWCA for 2 years and spent an additional year as a hotline volunteer and medical advocate.
While the topic is a very difficult one to think about, it is an extremely important one to talk about. According to a 2015 Huffington Post article and a study published online in the Journal of Adolescent Health, nearly one in five college women were victims of rape or attempted rape during their freshmen year, with the most falling prey during their first three months on campus, according to a new study. Last September, CNN published that, out of 150,000 student surveyed at 27 universities, 23% of female college students reported some form of unwanted sexual contact.
According to The National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, Inc. (NCADD) at www.ncadd.org, 90% of acquaintance rape and sexual assault on college campuses involves the use of alcohol by the assailant, victim, or both.
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