Students want DU to make its campus safer

Anonymous Instagram account lists incidents of sexual assault, harassment

An anonymous Instagram account detailing more than 50 stories of University of Denver students experiencing sexual assault or harassment is calling on school officials to make the campus safer. DU leaders this week said they can and will do better, but some student leaders are not assured.

The account — wecandubetter — began posting about ending gender-based violence on DU’s campus on Jan. 12, encouraging students to share their experiences of sexual assault and harassment anonymously.

The stories include students being drugged at parties, raped at fraternity houses and feeling disappointed by the university’s response when they reported such incidents. Since then, the account has gained more than 1,600 followers, posted dozens of stories and made specific demands of campus officials.

Some of those demands, posted Sunday, include:

• Requesting DU’s Campus Safety receive trauma-informed training and hire more officers of color and female officers who have worked with survivors of trauma.

• Calling for more lighting on campus, along with fixed blue light phones that allow students to call for help if their phones die.

• Asking that those who have been found responsible for gender-based violence offenses such as rape be removed from campus.

On Monday, DU chancellor Jeremy Haefner, vice chancellor for campus life and inclusive excellence Lili Rodriguez and Title IX coordinator Jeremy Enlow issued a five-page response, addressing each demand.

In the letter, DU:

• Promised funding would not be reduced for resources associated with gender-based violence prevention and education “no matter what budget cuts we may need to make.”

• Committed to upgrading trauma-informed training for all campus safety personnel, faculty members, staff members and students.

• Said perpetrators found responsible for gender-based violence would be punished in alignment with the university code of conduct.

DU officials declined Wednesday

to be interviewed further for this story.

Shannon Saul, DU student government secretary on gender violence topics and co-president of the Collegiate Council on Gender Violence Topics, said she is a survivor of sexual assault and wants to see more from her campus after witnessing the outpouring of stories on the Instagram page.

“I would like to see more specific commitments from the university and less focus explaining what they’ve already done,” Saul said. “What more can they do? We know they’ve done things in this area. That’s great. Obviously, it’s not working. There are so many stories on this page, and it’s very obvious that something needs to change.”