News
SMART prepares new student training programs
By Emily Eisler ’17
December 1, 2016
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SMART’s purpose is to better equip all members of the Hamilton community to help prevent and combat sexual misconduct on campus. One of their concerns is the lack of reporting from student survivors, which they feel indicates a lack of trust in the College’s policy for dealing with sexual assault. Operating around a belief that increased reporting at hamilton would represent a parallel increase in students’confidence in the administration’s ability to protect and support survivors, SMART has been working to find ways to make the reporting process more accesible and comfortable for survivors of sexual assault or misconduct. Currently, Hamilton provides students with a number of confidential resources with whom to discuss this issue, such as the Health and Counseling Centers, the Chaplaincy, and the SAVES-trained Peer Advocates. SMART, however, is creating their own student advisor program as well as working with the Hamilton administration to expand the reach of these confidential services.
The SAVES program already trains some students as Peer Advocates through two one-hour training sessions each semester. While SMART officers believe that this program is important and helpful to survivors, they do not think that their training is extensive enough to be fully effective. Charlotte Bennett ’17 explained, “It is important to educate our campus on ways to support survivors, but I believe this support should extend beyond regurgitating policy language from a PowerPoint presentation.”
SMART also suggests that the Hamilton College website improve its accessibility of resources for survivors. They suggest a tab labeled “Title IX” be added to the homepage linking to information and all available resources for survivors of sexual misconduct so that students can easily figure out which avenue they prefer to take. SMART would also like to see the addition of an online form to the website that would allow students to report incidences of sexual harassment or violence either anonymously or with their contact information, according to their own preference. This would allow for the College to more accurately report the statistics on sexual misconduct on campus without drawing unwanted attention to survivors who do not wish to be identified or discuss their experience.
SMART is shifting the reporting process further into the students’ hands because, as Bennett continued, “Relying on faculty advisors in the reporting and investigative process is problematic. Not only do faculty not receive specific training on the issues related to Title IX policy and procedure, but they have to face an inherent conflict of interest; the survivor they are meant to stand by may be fighting against the institution that employs them. Is this truly an adequate resource for survivors?”
To combat this issue, SMART aims to train a team of student advisors, called the Policy Advisors for Sexual Assault (PASA), to replace faculty advisors as an available confidential resource for students. These advisors would be chosen through a rigorous application and interview process, with chosen students undergoing an intensive training program implemented by SMART’s Policy Committee focused on Hamilton’s investigative processes and policies as well as strategies to emotionally support survivors. These advisors are meant to help students through the entire investigative process, accompanying survivors to meetings, interviews and other steps of their investigation. PASA would also have to report to the Title IX Coordinator so that the College can have accurate statistics on sexual misconduct on campus, but they would only report numbers and data, never personal information. SMART hopes to include faculty in the PASA program as well eventually, but the committee is still figuring out how to best implement that.