Complete Results: 2015 Campus Attitudes on Sexual Assault

The Collegian released the complete results of its Campus Attitudes on Sexual Assault survey Wednesday, and the full report can be read here.

In March 2015, The Collegian administered the survey to all undergraduate students at University of Richmond. The survey asked respondents questions about their social and cultural experiences while attending and before attending Richmond, including their sexual experiences. The purpose of this survey was to provide data regarding the social and cultural climate of Richmond’s campus to the community. The Collegian’s preliminary report was published March 24.

Westhampton College Dean Juliette Landphair will ensure that her staff reads the survey data and her staff will discuss it over the summer while planning for the coming school year, she wrote in an email.

“I see a lot of good news in this survey with regard to how students think about helping one another and where to turn for help,” she wrote, “and I also see room for improvement in certain areas and where we could focus more educational efforts.”

About one in three Richmond undergraduate students responded to the survey. Of the 1,004 started surveys, 621 were completed. The response rates to individual questions varied significantly.

About 42 percent of undergraduate females responded to the survey. More than half the females who responded answered that they have experienced some sort of unwanted sexual behaviors while at University of Richmond. Close to seven in ten (69%) of respondents who indicated they had an unwanted sexual experience at University of Richmond told someone else about the incident(s), but fewer than 4 percent reported the experience(s) to someone in an official capacity.

Kerry Fankhauser, associate dean and deputy Title IX coordinator for Westhampton College, was not surprised by much of the data from the survey, based on results from similar surveys nationwide, she said.

“One out of five women is sexually assaulted in college,” according to a 2014 report published by Vice President Joe Biden and the White House Task Force to Protect Students From Sexual Assault.

The Collegian staff modeled this survey off of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s 2014 Community Attitudes on Sexual Assault survey. The Collegian received permission from the MIT office of the provost to use its survey as a model.

The report is a comprehensive documentation of the results received. The data include survey responses from participants who identified as male or female. It does not include data from participants who identified as transgender or other genders to protect the privacy of the small sample size.

Contact Clay Helms at clay.helms@richmond.edu or Jack Nicholson at jack.nicholson@richmond.edu