LARAMIE, Wyo. (AP) - University of Wyoming psychologists found that more than one in four students experienced at least one instance of sexual assault during their time at the university.
The findings come from a wide-ranging survey conducted during the spring 2018 semester of student experiences and perceptions.
“These numbers are not atypical,” said psychology professor Matt Gray, who co-wrote the survey with graduate student Tess Kilwein. “They are tragically high and unacceptably high, but they aren’t atypical.”
University President Laurie Nichols said the prevalence of sexual harassment, sexual assault and rape at the university depicted in the survey is “completely unacceptable,” but added the new data confirms a “hunch” she had that the university is comparable to other institutions of its size.
“When you’re talking about sexual assault or rape, I think any numbers are too high,” she said. “I hate to see us at 27.1 percent . but on the flip side, it’s probably to some extent about where I thought we might be.
“I mean, we’re right on average with just about every other college campus in the nation.”
The University of Wyoming has a student population over 12,000.
The survey was conducted in part because of the discrepancy between large-scale studies and federally mandated reports under the Clery Act - which enumerate only crimes committed on campus and formally reported to law enforcement or University of Wyoming employees.
While large-scale empirical studies conducted across the United States suggest about one in five college women will be sexually assaulted during their college years, the University of Wyoming reported 19 on-campus rapes to the U.S. Department of Education in 2016.
The survey is the first of its kind and scale to be conducted at the University of Wyoming, with nearly 2,000 students completing the questionnaire.
“The survey confirms what we’ve suspected for a long time and that is that sexual misconduct occurs here at pretty much the same rates as what we’ve expected with the national averages,” said Jim Osborn, UW’s Title IX Coordinator and co-chair of the No More Committee, which commissioned the survey. “The numbers are higher than what most people are aware of, I think, but it’s why we’ve been working on these issues for so long.”
The No More Committee - also known as the University of Wyoming Sexual Misconduct Task Force - plans to meet and discuss both the survey’s findings and plans for addressing specific problems found in the survey.
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