Academy Discusses Sexual Citizenship at Assembly

By:  Sophie Ma, Kendra Wang, Alaysha Zhang

On Monday, April 4, students gathered in the Assembly Hall for a conversation between student panelists and authors Jennifer Hirsch and Shamus Khan, who published their recent study of campus-wide sexual assault in their newest book Sexual Citizens. The assembly required attendance from upperclassmen, who were provided with copies of the book before spring break, focusing primarily on questions surrounding the book submitted by students and organized by the panelists.

According to Assistant Principal Karen Lassey, planning for the event began in early December. “Members of the administrative team, Dr. Palmer, deans, Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS), the Health Human Development Department, and some other faculty met with Dr. Hirsch and Dr. Khan to hear more about their work and discuss the implications for secondary schools,” Lassey said.

Principal William Rawson explained that this conversation would be one of the Academy’s many steps in “improving programming to support safe learning environments and healthy sexual relationships.”

“This is just one way we look to external resources to help inform our thinking and our work,” Rawson said. “I thought the discussion we had about topics in their book was quite helpful to probe further some of their thinking and to talk through some of the misunderstandings about sexual assault that persist in our own community.”

“After [the speakers] met with the seniors and uppers, they met with Principal Rawson, Dr. Palmer, Dean of Faculty Ellen Wolff, and myself to continue that conversation,” Lassey added. “Later in the morning, other faculty joined. We covered a range of topics, from Exeter policies to some of the specific stories that reflect the general conclusions in their book.”

During the assembly, Hirsch and Khan discussed power dynamics, placing emphasis on the fact that one cannot make headway on sexual assault prevention by simply telling people to act better. “You need to address the underlying question of power on campus and in the world,” Hirsch explained.

 “I hope that people will use the concept of sexual geographies to think about how building communities of equity is [a form of] sexual assault prevention,” Khan added. “So that means thinking about gender, of course, but also all kinds of other intersecting forms of power: race, class, ability, sexuality, etcetera.” 

Hirsch continued to discuss the importance of taking a public health approach against sexual assault, which means thinking about prevention. “We talked [in the assembly] about broadening out who is considered responsible for sexual assault prevention so that it's not just schools. It's everyone, including families and all the institutions that shape young people's lives.”

Some students acknowledged that they felt initially hesitant about the assembly. “I feel like a lot of the time the school can give us books and topics to cover [on sexual assault], but I feel like we don't go much in-depth and it doesn’t turn into a long-lasting conversation among the students,” senior Tina Huang said.

“But I think the event itself with the speakers was very informative,” Huang added. “I don't think they could have went over all of the details because of the time constraints, but I think they covered a lot of important topics.”

Senior and student panelist Janessa Vargas expressed appreciation for the authors’ fresh perspective. “We really valued [the authors’] emphasis on treating sexual assault as a public health issue. It’s really taking a different approach to sexual-assault prevention rather than simply focusing on punishment, which I think is what we focus on here,” Vargas said.

Upper Izzie Riccardi agreed, noting especially the authors’ authentic and honest responses. “I feel like the many [sexual assault assemblies] in the past have focused on ‘how we can avoid this’ and ‘how we can avoid having sex in general.’ But they know that college students and even students on campus are going to be having sex,” Riccardi said.

“Sometimes people are like, ‘Oh, we’re afraid to have these conversations [about sex] with students at a young age,’ say, ninth grade,” Hirsch shared in an interview with The Exonian. “Our answer is, ‘Well, you teach people to drive before they start driving.’ Similarly, you need to have these conversations with young people. We wouldn't say that they have to start with sexual assault, but they have to start by talking about sex.”

“Additionally, I think that the educational aspect of the sexual assault awareness month programming is really important,” student panelist and upper Jennifer Finkelstein added. “I think sometimes you lose sight of your very limited knowledge. It was really important to participate in learning on top of other events like Take Back the Night.”

“I honestly think it was a really wonderful intro to the month of April,” student panelist and senior Lyric Zimmerman said.

Some students shared recommendations for future events. “One thing that did frustrate me about the nature of the assembly is that only uppers and seniors were required to attend [and received the email],” upper Gracie Keyt said. “I think that’s ridiculous because sexual assault and issues of sexual misconduct affect students regardless of what age you are or if you're going into college. This is happening on our campus as well. It’s important that it’s opened up to the entire school.”

“I do think that this assembly was a step in the right direction,” Keyt continued. “But I also think that we still lack tangible mechanisms in place to make students feel protected and safe on campus, as well as effective ways of dealing with sexual assault when it does happen. Because it's not an ‘if’ question, it's a ‘when’ question.”

Upper Liam Brown called attention to how this specific assembly approached sexual assault differently. “I think the approach they took was very direct. Seeing authors treating sexual assault as a public health issue as opposed to an individual moral issue was very interesting. But I also want to hear Principal Rawson or some of the deans get up on stage and say, ‘Hey, we have a problem, and this is what that problem is’ in plain terms. I haven’t heard any of them say frankly and directly what the issue is and I very much wish they would,” Brown said.

Upper Cindy Su commented on the need to increase awareness leading up to the event as well. “I think that they should’ve prepared the campus for a better discussion. I didn't know that we were supposed to read the book over break, so I wish there was a little bit more instruction on that.”

“I also wish that there was more time spent with [the authors],” Su added. “I wanted to have a lunch Q&A session with them.”

Khan hoped that students will remain optimistic when tackling serious issues such as sexual assault. “We hope that students will not approach the problem from a perspective of hopelessness and fear, but instead to be filled with a sense of empathy and hope for concrete things that they can advocate for within their communities,” Khan said.