Easily accessible residence halls, predictable schedules and limited campus security makes the Tufts campus a prime area for stalking and
harassment.
Although most students feel safe at Tufts, incidents of sexual assault and harassment have been reported already this year. (Due to confidentiality issues, details cannot be released.) Elaine Theodore of the Tufts Women's Center, however, believes that most cases have gone unreported: according to the National Sexual Victimization of College Women Survey, 83 percent of women who were stalked did not notify campus police.
"What we see on campus is people who follow other students, monitor a student's behavior, find out what classes they have where and send inappropriate e-mails," said Peggy Barrett, Director of the Women's Center. Cases such as these don't meet the legal criteria for stalking, which require a threat to the victim's life, but do fall under the definition of harassment.
Most of the time, Tufts "stalkers" do not intend to hurt their victims but are pursuing romantic relationships in an inappropriate manner.
"They either do not understand or choose not to respond to the normal social cues that people use to curtail unwanted interactions, such as ignoring the person," Barrett said. "Regardless of the perpetrator's benign intent, it can be very scary for the victim, and that's valid and that's real."
Harassers who do not intend to hurt or upset their victims and are just people with poor social skills, often need to be told by professionals such as counselors at the Women's Center or the Tufts University Police Department (TUPD), to stay away.
For perpetrators with more malicious intent, the Judicial Affairs Officer in the Dean of Students Office can issue warnings, and if behavior continues, can take disciplinary action. Civil Stay Away orders can be issued by TUPD.
On-campus institutions such as the Women's Center also provide counseling for the victim, whose academic performance, friendships and level of trust are often affected by the feelings of threat that they have experienced.
Other resources on the Tufts campus include SSARA and the counselor-on-call. SSARA is 24-hour hotline manned by trained students who are prepared to respond within 15 minutes to cases of sexual assault and relationship violence. A counselor-on-call is available 24-hours a day for students through the campus police which anonymously pages a trained counselor on-call in emergency situations.
SSARA counselors are interviewed before being admitted to the group. Once admitted they must complete four weeks of training and take a women's studies course. A SSARA counselor is on-call at all times with a manual of on- and off-campus resources.
"There are so many resources on campus that most people don't know about," sophomore and SSARA member Emily Zimmermann said. "It's especially helpful in emergency situations to have a book in front of you that lists resources and contact information."
While SSARA does receive emergency calls on their hotline, the group believes that many Tufts students are unaware of the hotline, as well as the many other services provided at Tufts and in the surrounding communities. However, using a grant from the Department of Justice Violence Against Women Office, the Women's Center is developing and circulating educational pamphlets which will inform students about violence against women, preventative measures, and available resources.
It is also mandatory for all first-year students to attend In The SACK during orientation week. In the SACK (an acronym for Safety, Awareness, Consent and Knowledge in relationships) is run by students and includes monologues, a guest speaker, and a presentation on rape and sexual assault statistics.
This year, the presentation also warned students not to use Thefacebook (http://www.thefacebook.com), an online directory where college students create social networks by connecting their own profiles with the profiles of friends. Members of Thefacebook can choose to post pictures and personal information on their profiles, including phone numbers, screen names, home and school addresses, and a list of the classes they take, making it easy for stalkers and harassers to find and locate victims.
Many Tufts students use Thefacebook, but many are aware of the dangers of giving out too much information and are taking precautions. "People joke about it and blatantly call it a stalker manual," junior Jillian Hochstrasser said.
"It hasn't happened to me personally, but I can see how Thefacebook could be used as a tool for stalking, because you can see and get a lot of information about a person you don't know," said junior Alice Chiou, who discussed campus stalking in her Rape Aggression Defense (RAD) class. "People I've never met before message me."
Whether through Thefacebook or e-mail, stalkers often use the Internet to contact their targets. "E-mail provides a certain anonymity which allows you to feel confident saying and doing things you wouldn't say face to face," Theodore said. "Social internet interaction can be so fun, so flirty, and so particularly dangerous."
Theodore and Barrett are working to make help college students create healthy relationships at college, which can be hard, especially for first year students who don't know many people. They also hope to make students aware of the importance of the bystander in stalking, harassment and sexual assault cases. Often times calls to report incidents are made by friends, not the victims themselves.
However, as Theodore pointed out, most students are unaware there is even a threat to look out for. "People assume that [stalking] doesn't happen at Tufts, it's inoculated, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen," she said. "It does."
Friendly intervention and education about ways to keep safe are often enough to prevent harassment from continuing, but in cases when they're not, the Women's Center, SSARA and Counselors On-call are available to the Tufts community. 617-627-7272 (SSARA), 617-627-4640 (Women's Center), Campus Police (617-627-3030).
