New Figures Present Encouraging News for Campus Safety
Updates from Lexington
The General Fraternity office released participation figures in April following the launch last fall of a new educational development program aimed at promoting healthy relationships and bystander intervention.
Participation numbers were encouraging with over 6,000 Sigma Nu members completing the workshop. In a post-workshop survey, 94% of respondents said their fellow chapter members were more likely to say or do something to intervene in preventing misconduct. 94% said more brothers understood the importance of intervening. 93% expressed feeling more confident in intervening if presented with an opportunity.
Collegiate brothers participating in an educational session at the College of Chapters last January. Earlier this year the Fraternity launched the Social Strenghts workshop, the latest addition to a comprehensive offering of educational programs.
“The national conversation surrounding campus safety is starting to shift from raising awareness to pursuing actionable prevention methods,” said Brad Beacham, executive director of Sigma Nu Fraternity. “This program was created and implemented to empower our members to lead these prevention efforts on every campus where we operate. We are encouraged by the positive feedback the program has received so far and look forward to continuing this progress moving forward.”
Participants offered the following comments when asked to reflect on the program:
- “The Social Strengths workshop was a refreshingly different approach to discussing sexual assault and abuse in Greek life.”
- The Social Strengths workshop emphasized the importance of being the person to step in and not saying “it’s none of my business.”
- “My favorite thing about the workshop was how it talked about how to properly intervene in a bad situation and aspiring to be like a man you look up to.”
The Social Strengths workshop is a sexual assault, relational aggression, healthy relationships, and bystander intervention educational program for collegiate members. The two-hour workshop is presented by trained Sigma Nu staff members and delivered to Sigma Nu-specific collegiate audiences as part of the on-site consultations offered to each chapter and colony.
Sigma Nu Fraternity has been educating its members to identify and prevent sexual assault for many years, long before recent media coverage brought the problem of campus sexual assault to the forefront of the issues facing higher education. Sigma Nu was influential in calling for the GreekLifeEdu program that prepares students to prevent hazing, sexual assault and alcohol misuse. Sigma Nu was an early adopter of the course when it launched in 2008.
The Social Strengths Workshop was developed in partnership with Aaron Boe, M.S.Ed., a specialist in non-stranger sexual assault, relational violence prevention, healthy relationships, and bystander intervention. Aaron is the principal of Prevention Culture, where he develops and delivers bystander intervention and sexual assault prevention keynotes and curriculum.