Map Project Highlights Sexual Assault

It Happens Here (IHH), a student-organized sexual assault awareness and prevention group at the College, has launched its Map Project, an initiative which seeks to compile on-campus locations where students have experienced some form of sexual assault.

The student organization, co-founded last year by Margot Cramer ’12 and Luke Carroll Brown ’13.5, aims to promote open campus-wide discussions about sexual violence at the College through the sharing of personal stories from sexual assault survivors within the student body, in an effort to diminish the stigma and invisibility surrounding the issue.  IHH began their campaign last year with a spring event held in the McCullough Student Center, during which more than 20 students presented anonymous student monologues of sexual assault experiences in front of roughly 500 audience members.

“Our group believes there is power in sharing personal stories from members of our own community,” Brown wrote in email.  “Additionally, monologues allow emotions to come alive — we all know rape is a tragic problem … but hearing someone recount their experience makes the problem all the more real.”

Upon its founding, the group members voted against becoming a college-recognized official student organization and in doing so opted out of receiving funding from the school.

“With that funding comes a certain loss of agency,” explained Caitlin Waters ’13, an active IHH member who is co-leading the group this semester. “That is a loss we are not willing to risk.”

The Map Project, which kicks off IHH’s second year, was introduced in anticipation of their Spring 2013 event, which will be similar to last year’s inaugural event.  Students who have been sexually assaulted on campus are encouraged to anonymously submit specific building names or other locations where they were violated through IHH’s online website.  Submissions will be accepted through the fall and part of the spring semester, at which time the campus locations will be marked on an enlarged campus map and displayed publicly in the days leading up to the group’s spring event.

IHH members have expressed hope that the Map Project will personalize the widespread problem of sexual violence.

“[Pinpointing sexual assault occurrences] to a location will make it really relevant to people,” Emily Pedowitz ’13, co-leader of IHH, explained. “It’s making sexual assault visual, and I think by making it visual, it will lead to more conversation. And hopefully that conversation will lead to more ideas and I think lead to a better culture … a more aware culture.”

Group leaders are aware that potential opposition and discomfort may arise from the display of the maps, and some students have already voiced concerns over the public presentation of locations of sexual assault.

“[The map] could give negative reputations to certain social houses or residence halls … and it could effect everyone who lives in such a place,” says Katherine Kucharczyk ’16.

Thilan Tudor ’16 adds: “I think the Map Project stigmatizes certain areas and locations on campus and it just puts a disproportionate burden on certain areas just because an isolated event may … have occurred there.”

IHH is not associated with the school’s Sexual Assault Oversight Committee (SAOC); however, both organizations represent the growing community effort to provide education and prevention of sexual assault on campus.

“The first step towards creating a sexual-assault-free campus is acknowledging that it exists at Middlebury, and working as a community to understand and address the many complex factors that contribute to its occurrence,” wrote Associate Dean for Judicial Affairs and Student Life Karen Guttentag in an email.

In addition to the Map Project and the spring events, IHH is working to expand their initiative to other colleges and communities.  Brown and the IHH group encourage students interested in joining, adding a location, or submitting a story, to visit go/ithappenshere.