Caitlin Flanagan '24
Staff Editor
On October 17, the Student Bar Association invited two members of the local Sexual Assault Resource Agency (SARA) to guide a conversation with law students about resources for victims of sexual violence and ways to shape a preventative culture which decreases risk factors for abuse. Carley Mack, the Director of SARA’s prevention team, and Jacqueline Schell, an advocate on SARA’s client services team, joined a group of law students who hoped to discuss their experiences in the Law School and to learn about SARA’s work here in Charlottesville.
Mack began the discussion by describing the work that SARA does in town and in the surrounding counties. The organization’s focus is on providing trauma-informed support services to survivors, as well as identifying creative ways to make communities safer and more empathetic. Practically, their advocates’ broad range of work includes serving as a liaison between victims of sexual assault and their medical providers in local hospitals, collaborating with the University’s Title IX office to ensure that students are aware of SARA’s resources, and assisting survivors with a range of needs. SARA is able to offer survivors care from their own in-house therapy team, and also assists them with filling other critical needs, such as legal representation and safe housing. Mack shared that her favorite part of work is getting tuned into the great range of community resources which are available to provide holistic support to individuals who have survived sexual violence.
Given our context here in the Law School, several questions arose regarding the relationship between SARA and the University’s Title IX office. SARA has a relationship with the UVA Title IX coordinator, Molly Zlock, but emphasized that the scope of SARA’s work with the University is, for the most part, survivor-led. For example, if a student has been a victim of sexual violence and would like an anonymous report to be filed on their behalf, SARA can file that report and subsequently coordinate with the student.
The group discussed the importance of truly confidential resources to a victim of sexual violence. It is essential for many survivors to identify a point of contact who is sensitive to the trauma of sexual violence, well-informed regarding the various plans of action that a victim can take, and who will not break the conversation’s confidentiality, regardless of the gravity of what has occurred. SARA’s representatives discussed the difference between a confidential resource and a mandatory reporter, and recommended that any law student who wants to have a conversation without reporting repercussions get in contact with their advocates.
The roundtable discussed prevention, as Mack and Schell asked the students about the Law School’s culture surrounding sexual violence and its impacts. The group noted that the Law School’s orientation, particularly as compared to other academic institutions, surprisingly does not include an in-person conversation or training regarding sexual assault prevention. Participants in the conversation proposed ways to change the culture surrounding sexual violence at the Law School, including ideas as simple as posting a flyer regarding resources like SARA in the restrooms and at events promoted within the Law School that involve heavy drinking, such as Barrister’s Ball or Bar Review.
Mack provided an example in the form of a poster which SARA has been using in trainings to change the culture around sexual violence in the restaurant industry. The poster describes ways to practice bystander awareness, in the form of “three D’s”: direct, delegate, or distract. Mack provided examples of preventing sexual violence which would fall under each of these categories, to include directly telling someone to stop their threatening behavior, asking someone who is a good friend of an involved party to break up an escalating situation, or distracting someone who seems to be crossing another person’s personal boundaries by telling them that they dropped their wallet near the bar.
SARA’s representatives and the members of the Law School community discussed potential push-back to increasing awareness of sexual violence, and agreed regarding the importance of continuing these important discussions in our community.
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cf3tf@virginia.edu