Thanks to Jenna for bringing up Jezebel’s post on the recent Chronicle of Higher Ed article about rape prevention programs on college campuses. Please do check out Jezebel’s post for a great analysis of the article, pointing out a lot of concerns with assumptions about rape prevention programs. Personally, I think we need an approach that covers multiple angles, and the bystander programs are really promising. The catch with the bystander approach is that it also needs to include education about the dynamics of rape and its underlying issues (sexism, racism, etc).

I think what this Chronicle report really brings home for me is the need to evaluate. Otherwise we’re all just guessing at what works and what doesn’t work. Clearly, there are many inherent challenges in evaluating rape prevention programs. We don’t have accurate reporting statistics, so how can we really know if prevention programs are preventing rapes? We can measure social norms and beliefs, but we don’t know if changing those leads to behavior change. There are many scales out there to measure beliefs (see the State of Arizona’s Sexual Violence Prevention and Education Program’s evaluation page, and there are studies that try to measure behaviors. But the problem brought up by these studies is that in most cases, attitude changes are not sustained over time, and therefore are not likely to affect future behavior.

This article on VAWnet that reviews the existing literature points out that virtually all evaluation (and prevention programs for that matter) are conducted with college students. Many practitioners believe we need to start earlier. They also point out another problem with the college student population is we don’t know if the results are generalizable to other populations.

The article provides some suggestions as to future evaluation directions that are promising – check it out here. There are emerging strategies that are promising, such as bystander education and social norms marketing. There clearly isn’t one solution that will fit all, all campuses and communities are different. That’s what it’s important to advocate for programs that will resonate with the population you’re working with. Additionally, SAFER’s approach, to work to build a movement on campuses to change policy, is useful to consider because policy operates at a macro level and the change, once it is made, is sustainable. We’re also launching an Assessment and Evaluation committee to explore ways to better evaluate our own programs and their impact. Evaluation can be discouraging, but you have to start somewhere!