According to USA Today it's estimated that only a very small fraction of on-campus sexual assault victims go to the police.  How could this possibly be? The U.S. government decided to take a look.  Senators today think we can do a better job of protecting ourselves from this horrendous crime, and he says it starts with what we already have in place: "I'm concerned that the specter of flawed law enforcement overshadows the harm of marginalized law enforcement," says Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. 

This new governmental concern comes in the wake of a recently misreported gang-rape that allegedly occurred at a Fraternity house on the University of Virginia campus. The article was written by The Rolling Stone, who later said they made major mistakes in their original report.

But there's a lot more that needs to be considered in this situation. It's fair to say some of these victims won't go to the police because of embarrassment, and others are encouraged by their university to seek help within its boundaries for many reasons - such as: criminal charges are a lot more serious than expulsion, the Fraternity would immediately be kicked off of campus, and the school would gain a bad reputation. But whatever we are doing today clearly isn't working, and the Senate believe it's due to the marginalization of police enforcement.

According to Federal data, on-campus sexual assault has increased by 50% from 2009-2012 (yeah FIFTY).  With these high numbers, statisticians have determined that 1 in 5 women are assaulted in their college years (absolutely disgusting).  

Today the Senate is working on a bill "that would force colleges to have a memorandum of understanding with their local law enforcement over handling such cases" (USA Today). The ultimate goal of this bill is for 100% of the victims to go to the police, but they also recognize the negatives of the situation.  

The Rolling Stone article may have permanently ridiculed the fraternity and university they mentioned. Also, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand recognizes that "...time and again, I have heard from far too many survivors of campus sexual assault that they have felt re-victimized by the process of trying to seek justice for the crime committed against them."

Clearly there is no perfect solution, and the only way to end this is for the students themselves to stop committing this unforgivable crime. IT'S ON US.  

Take the pledge to end this once and for all: http://itsonus.org

Article of reference: http://college.usatoday.com/2014/12/09/senate-hear...