For most University students, the recent Public Safety e-mail informing the campus community of a female student reported she was sexually assaulted has not made them feel less safe. Believed to have been perpetrated by Wesleyan students at an off campus party on High Street, the assault is being investigated by Public Safety and the Middletown Police Department.
On a campus as small as Wesleyan, an incident like this has the potential to effect far more people than those directly involved. But many students do not feel that their sense of security has changed as a result.
“I do feel safe on campus despite the Public Safety report that was sent out,” said Ewurabena Hutchful ’07. “I always walk out at night by myself and don’t feel endangered, except maybe when I’m walking out into Middletown, past Hi-Rise. Then I feel like I have to have somebody with me. But walking around campus I feel fine. Definitely, in different program houses and frat houses I feel fine.”
Hutchful reported that she knew what resources were available on campus to keep students safe.
Some students had not read the Public Safety e-mail and were not aware of last week’s incident.
“I wasn’t aware of it,” said Tamar Marino ’07. “I feel pretty good about my safety at Wesleyan. I’ve never felt unsafe on campus, even at night. But I don’t really find myself alone on campus, even at night, so I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve felt unsafe.”
Marino is confident in her ability to access the resources that Public Safety provides.
“I know that there are the blue light [emergency telephones] on campus. My friends and I always use the safety shuttles to get from place to place,” she said.
Jessica Rhodes ’07 pointed out that life on campus may not be perfectly safe, but it has to be considered in relation to the rest of the world.
“It’s a really disappointing thing to hear about, to know that that’s happening. But it happens everywhere,” Rhodes said. “I generally feel pretty safe at Wesleyan. I hope that she’s okay and that everything’s fine; it worries me that it happened but it happens everywhere, so it’s kind of a difficult balance to maintain.”
Leah Katz ’07 took a similar approach.
“I don’t really feel less safe because I feel as though incidents like this happen a lot and if you let yourself go insane after every single incident like this on any college campus, then you’re giving in to it,” Katz said. “Incidents like this make me feel more aware, and put [the threat of sexual assault] at the front of my mind if I go out, rather than not thinking about it at all. But I don’t feel any more unsafe, I’m just more aware.”
Rhodes expressed a certain amount of wariness regarding frat houses.
“It can be scary to go to a place that you aren’t familiar with, where everybody is drinking; maybe some people don’t feel that way, but it is scary,” she said.
Rhodes, too, was familiar with the resources provided by Public Safety.
“There’s the blue phones,” she said, “and those whistles that don’t really do much.”
Many male students expressed disappointment about the sexual assault.
“I’m shocked, absolutely shocked,” said Dan Yeoman ’04.
One female upperclassman commended the female victim for reporting the assault.
“I don’t feel less safe because I feel like this happens frequently, it’s just not reported,” said Krystl Giordano ’04. “So good for her for reporting it.”
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