On Cornell – How to Protect Your Child When Their College Won’t – with Nicole Bedera
We Can Do Hard ThingsShow Notes
The most shocking thing about the Cornell and LSU sexual assault cases? That Cornell and LSU delivered more substantial results to those survivors than that afforded to 95% of college women brave enough to report their assaults to Universities.
So what actually happens when a student reports a sexual assault to their university?
Amanda sits down with sociologist and On the Wrong Side author Dr. Nicole Bedera—the researcher who spent a year embedded inside a university Title IX system—to pull back the curtain on the process we tell our kids to trust.
They reveal:
- How the vast majority of sexual assault reports lead to absolutely nothing;
- The crucial difference between filing a report and a formal complaint;
- The profound conflict of interest at the heart of a system run by the same institution whose reputation, liability, and finances are threatened by what it uncovers;
- What specific questions we should ask to actually find out if a college is a safer place to send our child; and
- Most importantly: If your child calls from college and tells you they have been sexually assaulted, who should you to talk to first, what specific things should you do, and what should you not do?
This episode is for every parent with a child in college, every student heading there, and anyone who cares about keeping our children safe.
About Nicole Bedera, Ph.D.:
Nicole Bedera, Ph.D. is a sociologist and author of the book On the Wrong Side: How Universities Protect Perpetrators and Betray Survivors of Sexual Violence. Her research broadly focuses on how our social structures contribute to survivors’ trauma and make sexual violence more likely to occur in the future. Her work has been featured in many popular media outlets, including The New York Times, NPR, Time Magazine, and Teen Vogue. Nicole puts her work into practice as an affiliated educator at the Center for Institutional Courage, as a co-founder of Beyond Compliance Consulting, and as a co-founder of the nonprofit The Survivor Alumni Network.
Read more from Nicole Bedera:
https://slate.com/human-interest/2020/03/daughter-advice-sexual-assault-college.html
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