April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month. Did you know that 1 in 5 female college students will be the victim of sexual assault before they graduate? As a female college student, that is one freaky statistic, and it makes me wonder, what is my school doing to protect me against sexual assault? And what is your school doing to protect you? It is important to know and that you get involved, because sometimes, schools aren’t doing enough. There are some college campuses that have high rates of sexual assault but don’t have the resources to deal with it. National Public Radio (NPR) recently did a series on how many of our country’s colleges fail to prevent women from sexual assault, which I agree with, because some colleges obviously aren’t doing enough to prevent sexual assault if almost a quarter of all female college students become victims before they graduate. NPR found that many schools are not properly equipped to investigate rape cases, and more often than not, schools are not properly punishing sexual assault offenders, usually letting them off with little more than slaps on the wrist. Also the Center for Public Integrity found that students “responsible” for sexual assault on college campuses often face little or no consequences because of the flaws in many college judicial systems. This is a serious flaw that we need to do something about. That is why I think students need to learn how their school deals with sexual assault. It doesn’t matter what school you go to, whether your school has high rates of sexual assault or not, it is always important to be involved with issues that affect you and your peers. Show support for student organizations that deal with sexual assault, even if you haven’t been affected by sexual assault yourself. Sign up for their mailing list, join their facebook page, go to meetings, or volunteer. Support these organizations to show your school that you care about how they deal with sexual assault and show students that have been affected by sexual assault that they are not alone. And if your school doesn’t have student organizations, policies or resources for sexual assault, check out some of the resources below to find out what you can do to get involved. It is important to get involved to show your school that how it treats sexual assault matters to you. Learn more by looking at these resources: *What is sexual assault? *The Center for Public Integrity offers a Reporter’s Toolkit to help report sexual assault. *Go to safercampus.org to see how your campus’ sexual assault policy compares to other schools’ across the country. *Men Can Stop Rape * Sexual Assault Information and Articles at Center for Public Integrity *At NPR, read about stories from sexual assault victims and how their schools responded *Watch a video about a strategy to prevent sexual assault at a party.