Aware And Prepared

How to Keep Your Kid Safer at College, Sexual Assault Laws and Prevention

• Mandi Pratt • Season 4 • Episode 11

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0:00 | 17:18

Mandi breaks down campus safety from a legal and prevention standpoint, sharing key legislation every parent and student should know before orientation day.

From the Jeanne Clery Act to Texas' new Summer Willis Act, Mandi covers the laws shaping campus sexual assault reporting, what colleges are now required to do, and why prevention has to include all genders. She also shares how to have the hard conversations at home, what to do if something happens, and why bystander responsibility is everyone's issue.

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TIMESTAMPS

[01:33] Campus safety overview and workshop announcement 

[02:17] Conference on Crimes Against Women key takeaways 

[03:36] The Jeanne Clery Act explained 

[04:56] The Summer Willis Act and defining consent in Texas 

[6:42] Texas Senate bills: Title IX orientation requirements and mandatory reporting 

[6:58] Supportive vs. harmful responses to survivors 

[8:24] Educating all genders - why boys need the conversation too 

[9:36] People-pleasing, boundaries, and saying no clearly 

[10:20] Survivor-centered campus processes and prevention work 

[11:23] What to teach kids before college - social media, bystander responsibility 

[13:52] Reporting options and knowing it's never the victim's fault 

[15:37] Summer college safety workshop details and close

The primary purpose of the Women Aware and Prepared Podcast is to educate and inform. This podcast series does not constitute advice or services. Please use common sense for your own situation.

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Hey, welcome back to the Aware and Prepared podcast. I'm Mandy, your host and founder, CEO of Women Aware and Prepared. Before we get started, this episode does cover some heavy topics, so if you have little ones nearby, please save this one for solo listening time. 

Now, this is honestly something every parent and student should hear before heading off to college, and really even before high school or even junior high. Hey, brave one. Welcome to the Aware and Prepared Podcast. I'm your host, Mandy Pratt, trauma-informed, resilient speaker, domestic violence victim advocate, and narcissistic abuse survivor. Here we keep it real with true crime stories and real world strategies to prevent emotional and physical harm. 

My guests and I share a mix of insight and survivor grit, all to help you feel safer, trust yourself more deeply. And live with greater peace and power. Let's trade fear for freedom and step into the peace that you deserve. 

So we're talking about campus safety, key laws you may want to know, how to have the hard conversations with your family, with your kids, and why prevention has to include all genders. And speaking of prevention, I am offering my college safety workshops this summer only. 

These are two to three-hour trauma-informed, skills-based workshops covering situational awareness, communication and boundaries, healthy relationships, and basic self-defense, available in person or online for groups. You can find my contact info at the end of the show notes. There's a little blip down there that says, "Send me a message," or you can reach out through my website, which is also linked in the show notes. 

It's awareandprepared.life. All right, let's get into it. Today, I want to share with you some information that I learned at the Conference on Crimes Against Women. The very, very first session that I attended was one that was led by an officer at the Southern Methodist University. And they were talking about campus sexual assault reporting. So they were sharing that Title IX and student affairs, sometimes it's tricky dealing with law enforcement because sometimes they don't want to get law enforcement involved because maybe sometimes the victim just wants it handled on campus, so they want it just on campus, not criminal. 

Um, sometimes a victim can share with a chaplain and not tell anybody else. Sometimes they anonymously report online, which is confidential, like maybe through RAINN, R-A-I-N-N, .org, which is a sexual assault hotline. So he was sharing with us some of the new or newer types of laws that have come about that help actually those looking to attend college. The first one is the, the Jeanne Clery Act, and I'll put this link in the show notes. So this law is named after Jeanne Clery, a 19-year-old Leigh University L-E-I-G-H University in Pennsylvania, student who was raped and murdered in her campus residence hall in 1986. Her murder triggered a backlash against unreported crime on campuses across the country here in the United States. 

You can look up the Jeanne Clery Act, before you choose a college, 'cause it will show the crime stats on campus and in the surrounding areas. And also with this act, the students get notified of activity in and around campus when, whenever a crime occurs, and they get emergency notifications. 

So the Clery Act requires all colleges and universities that participate in federal financial aid programs to keep and disclose information about crime on and near their respective campuses. Compliance is monitored by the US Department of Education, which can impose civil penalties per violation against ins-institutions for each infraction, and can suspend institutions from participating in federal student financial aid programs. 

Another law that was passed actually in Texas, um, not that long ago, back in November of '25, is the Summer Willis Act, and it confirms the definition of consent because there was a loophole. Before this law passed, Texas had no clear definition of consent in sexual assault cases, and survivors who said, "I didn't agree to that," were often met with silence from the legal system. 

Prosecutors couldn't always move forward, But because of Summer Willis' story, she accepted a drink at a bar and was later found unconscious and had been raped, and the case went nowhere. There was no clear way to argue what had happened to her was illegal. Wild, right? This wasn't a one-time issue. 

It was a legal loophole that many didn't realize existed. So now it defines what consent means during sexual encounters. Um, I'll leave the link to that, so if anybody wants to look at that, they can see that as well. And then there's a couple different, um, Senate bills that passed in Texas about making sure that, more detailed Title IX information is included in student orientation and making sure that the students are really aware of, addressing sexual assault, sexual harassment, dating violence, stalking. 

So they give resources and make sure that the students know about Title IX, and they even have the sexual assault hotline on their ID cards, which is so smart. I wish all of them had that. And then there was another bill passed talking about mandatory reporting for all faculty and staff. 

So I will share all of that in the show notes in case anybody wants to look into that. But he was also sharing something really important that I wanted to point out, and he was talking about initial response, and he was framing it more through the lens of those who work on campus and those who work with campuses, like resident assistants, first responders, EMS, investigators, and so forth, and he was talking about the importance of joint training. 

And he was sharing supportive responses versus harmful responses, and I thought this was applicable for everybody. So supportive responses are, "I'm glad you told me. This is not your fault." Harmful responses We start interrogating the victim, we blame them, we minimize them, we pressure them to report. 

That's not helpful And just to note, if the sexual assault occurs in another jurisdiction, like say off campus, but they're at a party, right? Then a connection needs to be made with the other law enforcement department. And hopefully, you know, your campus security will escort them over to the other, um, law enforcement office I'm super glad to hear that now some campuses are trying to identify and eliminate rape culture on campus. 

They're working actively with sororities and fraternities, and they're educating... I was so excited to hear this part. They're educating the young men. It's not bros will be bros, or how much is too much to drink? No. No. So it's important that when we send our kids off to college, you know, we focus so much on the gals, you know, telling them, "Be safe. Go with a friend. You know, carry your pepper spray. Do all this." 

But what we really, really need to be doing in concert with that is educating our young men. Like, "Hey, here's what consent is, you know?" And they'll say, "Oh, I already know about that. Don't talk to me about that." And say, "Well, I just wanna make sure we're clear because that is a felony too, and you go to prison for two to 20 years. 

So wanna make sure that you understand that when you're dating your girlfriend and she says, no, she doesn't want to, be intimate with you, you better listen, and you are not entitled to her body just 'cause you're dating her, right? 

Or because she's drunk or whatever. So it is your responsibility. You need to treat everybody with respect, and you need to listen to people's boundaries. When they set a boundary and they tell you no, then you have to listen to that and the gals, I feel like if we address them more with, you know, "Hey, we've been so conditioned to people please," right? And that makes it hard to say no sometimes. 

But you need to really watch out for yourself first and let people know what you like and don't like, what you want and don't want. And it might be hard to say that, but with practice, that can happen. So make sure that when you say no, that it's very clear. It's not no , you know? It's no. Let me repeat that. I said no. Right? So what college campuses really need to do is have a survivor-centered process, right? We're addressing prevention by talking with the students at orientation. 

We're making sure that students feel safe enough to disclose, and that we respond appropriately. We are even collaborating with local shelters, local rape crisis centers. We're offering outside training with lived experts. That's actually where I come in. I just did two keynotes at some local colleges here during April, which was Sexual Assault Awareness Month. I gave a keynote about ending victim blaming, in which I addressed the heart of prevention work, and that's making sure that we're aware of boundaries. 

Are we boundary busters? Are we setting boundaries? Are we comfortable to set boundaries? Addressing people-pleasing. Are we so conditioned that it's really hard for us to say no, say what we want and don't want, right? So all of this to say that the best prevention when you're sending your kids off to college, and even before that really should be in high school or even junior high, are some really important lessons. 

That would be, one, what you see on social media and with influencers are not real. Do you realize a lot of that behavior that you see is illegal, and if you tried that, you would end up in prison for years? And a lot of interactions on TV and movies aren't really healthy. When you watch movies or TVs together, you can use that as a springboard to say like, "What the heck did he just say? Like, that's so messed up, right?" 

Or, "You know, that was so uncool. Why do you think that was uncool? I think it is." You know, just open up the conversation and make sure that before they leave that they know, you know, hey, you might encounter this. Hopefully, you don't encounter it yourself, but you might have a friend that comes to you and says, "Hey, man, like-" I just saw something bad at a party and I don't know what to do, 

so it's important to know as a bystander what to do and, you know, we hear, "Hey, it's not my problem." Actually, it is because you're a human being and they're a human being, and everybody deserves to live in peace and safety. Here I go on my soapbox, and I'm not gonna apologize 'cause it's necessary. Everybody deserves to live in peace and safety, and so it's important to stand up for what's right and what's not. I will link a podcast episode in which I had my friend Kelly on, where we went through bystander intervention. 

She does training specifically about that, and they have actors that act that out so the students can see it in real life. What do you say, you know, in that kind of situation? So it's important to open up these conversations and to let them know, let the all genders know that if you see something, say something. You can tell a chaplain, you can tell your RA, you can tell student affairs, you can tell the mental health department, you can tell Title IX, you know. 

And yes, they will be mandatory reporters and they have to report except for the chaplain, I believe so. Um, or if you wanna stay confidential for sure, you can report online You can go to Rainn, R-A-I-N-N.org. You can just call to get the information. Why not ask, right? What are my steps that I might choose to take? And our students need to know also that if that happens to you, who is to blame, right?

It's always the perpetrator's fault. And you want them to be-- feel safe enough to be able to talk to you about something that happened or talk to somebody if they don't talk to you, talk to a friend or ideally the police or an expert. But you want them to feel safe enough to do that, right? To know, "Hey, like it's not my fault. 

I deserve to live in peace and safety, but this happened to me, so make sure you have those conversations open up the conversations while watching TV or movies or hearing something in the news. Ask them what their perspective is, and address and lead. Let them know what is acceptable behavior, what's a felony, and what they're entitled-- not entitled to. So let's address this whole big picture together because women's safety is a community issue. 

In fact, I am giving summer college safety workshops. They're two or three-hour skills-based workshops covering situational awareness, communication and boundaries, healthy relationships, basic self-defense, without victim blaming. And because I'm a certified victim advocate, everything is trauma-informed. So I've had people reach out to me and ask me, "Am I offering that this summer?" Yes. Yes, I am. I only offer it usually during the summer because that's when I'm not doing as much speaking. 

So you can reach out to me at the very end when you scroll through the show notes, you'll see send me a message or through my website, you'll see that. You can click on in the show notes as well. Or if you're getting my weekly email, you will get that information. So when you go to my website, scroll down, you'll see where you can sign up to be on my email list. I only send one a week, and it's always very helpful with resources. 

So I'm here to help. See you next time. Thanks for tuning into the Aware and Prepared Podcast. Curious how tuned in your intuition really is. Take the free quiz at Aware and Prepared Life and get your score. See how sharp your inner guide is. 

You are worthy of a safe and peaceful life. Talk with you next week and please share this episode with someone who came to mind while you were listening. Click on the top right menu in your podcast app. It might just be what they needed today.