Let’s talk about sex
Utah State University found itself ranked No. 119 out of 140 schools nationwide on Trojan’s 2014 sexual health report card. It fell from 103rd place last year.
Taboo topic
According to Bert Sperling, the lead researcher for the report card, the problem at USU is a lack of conversation on the topic.
“There is not much information available for students in regards to sexual health and that’s what we’re looking at,” Sperling said. “In particular it lacked information about contraception. We didn’t see anything available on the website or to students who want that kind of information about contraception.”
The rankings were not based on issues like sexually transmitted diseases or infections but rather on educational material about sex available to students.
“What we are looking at is for students, for whatever choice they decide to make, the information is there when they need it to be safe and healthy both for themselves and a partner,” Sperling said.
However James Davis, the executive director of the USU Health and Wellness Center, does not agree with the survey.
“To be honest with you my impression is that the survey that they perform is biased, and it is biased in a particular way that would show our community as not being very well served in terms of what we do,” he said.
Unique culture
Davis said that the lack of advertisement about sexual health is deliberate.
“I don’t think our grade always reflects what we really do, and the reason for that is we’re not bragging about it. We’re not that edgy,” Davis said. “I don’t think we advertise what we do to a high degree, and that is based mostly on the majority of the population here would be turned off by that.”
73.6 percent of students at USU said that they are not interested in information on sexually transmitted disease or infection prevention from the university, according to an American College Health Association survey of USU in spring of 2013.
Davis said that USU has different circumstances than most of the other universities ranked in the survey commisioned by Trojan but conducted by an independent research firm named Sperling’s Best Places.
“The thing that makes Utah State a little bit different is that over half of our students are married. You won’t find that anywhere else in the nation,” Davis said. “You’ll find it down the road at BYU, but you won’t find it at the University of Utah, not at Weber State, but Utah State and BYU have a high level of married students.”
BYU ranked last in the report card while the other two universities in Utah, Utah Vally University and the UofU, also failed to crack the top 100.
Need for education
Ann Austin, director of the Center for Woman and Gender, said that they should advertise.
“I think honestly, mentally, there might be a lot of denial,” Austin said. “This culture has fairly specific views about what is appropriate before marriage and what is appropriate after marriage, and I realize that not all students are part of the culture, or if they are, they are not necessarily interested in abiding by the culture’s ideas.”
Limiting the widespread conversation about sexual health can make for a difficult situation. At least that is what Dr. Leah Torres an OB/GYN at the Cache Valley Community Health Center thinks.
“That is an interesting conundrum, if you will, because human nature is such that we will explore our own curiosities. We could do that with or without being educated. So you may have heard of an analogy of having a swimming pool but not having learned how to swim,” Torres said. “I understand that that can be tricky to navigate, but at the same time it is important to give people the information so that they keep safe.”
Information available at student health centers
Despite the level of dialogue between students and health-care professionals, the researchers with the Trojan Sexual Health Report Card said that the facilities are still sufficient for students.
“What we find is that there is a consistency of excellence among all of the student health centers — that they offer tremendous care for the students and they certainly want to do everything that they can to make sure their students are healthy,” Sperling said. “So it’s not anything lacking at the student health center, but I think it’s a decision made at a high level on what kind of information to provide and whether it’s a matter of privacy for the students.”
Freshman LaRae Ashcraft works at the Health and Wellness Center and said that she thinks students know about the services, such as informative outlets, advice or even free condoms at the center available to them.
“We have SAAVI and the wellness center that is strictly for that,” Ashcraft said. “So there are programs here that help the students. I think they’re aware and they made that help available.”
However, knowing it’s available didn’t prevent 49.5 percent of USU students from saying they had not received information sexual assault/relationship violence prevention from their university in the ACHA’s 2013 survey. Then again 62.6 percent of students said they are not interested in getting that information from USU in the same survey.
Confusion about consent
“You know I used to think that there was a good understanding of consent, but just based on some things students have told me, I don’t think that there is,” Austin said. “I think there is still a sense that no really means yes.”
Consent is still a misunderstood area of sexual health.
“There are a lot of misconceptions. I think consent is a big one,” Torres said.
Davis also said that consent is an issue and recommended the adoption of a new term for consent.
“The old statement was ‘No means no.’ The new statement is ‘yes means yes,’ so you have to get affirmative consent,” he said. “We did a campaign on what consent really means, and we were approaching the point that you couldn’t be intoxicated and give consent.”
Torres said that the most important conversation about sexual health is between partners.
“With sexual health you always want to have an open and honest dialogue with the person that you are engaging with sexually,” she said. “I think that people have a hard time doing that quite often, so enabling that open discussion is the first step.”
Options for learning
Austin said that there are more educational and supportive outlets students could go to for help — outlets like Planned Parenthood, which has a branch in Logan, but whose purpose is misunderstood by students.
“I wonder if students understand about Planned Parenthood or what Planned Parenthood can do,” Austin said. “[Students] said, ‘Oh well that is the abortion place.’ Well, helping people find appropriate abortion providers is a small part of what they do, but a large part of what they do is just sexual health.”
The Health and Wellness Center’s priority is the availability of information for students.
“We stand ready to provide the services that our students need, but we don’t broadly advertise them or make a big issue of them; it’s just part of what we do,” Davis said.
Sperling said the rankings are supposed to examine what is being done to bring down the level of discomfort surrounding the sex conversation.
“I think the thing is whether they talk about sexual health in particular or just sexuality. It basically tries to break some of the awkwardness about talking about sex,” Sperling said. “If there is not quite that awkwardness anymore, then people are more likely to be safe and make smart choices when they are engaged in sexual behavior.”
Herpes outbreak
Davis said that herpes is spreading throughout USU because of students shaving their genital area, then partaking in oral sex with overly sensitive and exposed skin.
“We’re seeing an epidemic of students who are shaving their pubic area and with irritation getting herpes simplex transmitted from the mouth, from oral herpes simplex,” Davis said. “So we’ve got an outbreak on campus of herpes simplex type one in the genital area directly related to the shaving of the genitals.”
Davis warned that shaving pubic hairs is not a good idea.
“Kids, it’s not a good idea to shave the genitals, the hair is there for a reason and number two there are actually risks to it,” he said.
Men getting assaulted
Austin said that men getting sexually assaulted is a different kind of difficult situation, though it is still a problem.
“I also feel that guys who are assaulted either by a woman or another guy it is so shocking to them and they feel like it is an infringement on their manhood rather than an actual assault,” Austin said. “So it is very difficult for them, first of all to reconcile with themselves to admit what is happening, but secondly to receive help.”
Austin had a friend who is a doctor in an unspecified college town who said that male-on-male rapes often don’t get reported.
“She has seen, from time to time, a rash of male-on-male rapes. She said that that is a very difficult circumstance,” Austin said. “Because first of all, the men don’t understand, or don’t want to admit what is going on and secondly if they don’t report it then the pattern continues.”
When men get assaulted it is confusing for them and difficult to deal with mentally.
“Many many years ago a student confided in me about a male-on-male rape and it was just so difficult for his psyche on many different levels to admit that it happened,” Austin said. “It challenged his own sense of his masculinity. He didn’t stop it soon enough because he was shocked.”
Alcohol and consent
The grey area of consent is more blurred with alcohol.
“I think there is also a misunderstanding among freshman that when you are drinking you need to be a little more careful because your judgement may be a little bit more relaxed,” Austin said.
Of the three sexual assaults reported on campus last year through the SAAVI office involved inebriated individuals.
“Of those sexual assaults all three involved acquaintance assault and all three involved alcohol,” Davis said. “We’re not going to tell you not to have friends, but we are going to tell you not to drink then assume you have permission to have sexual activity. Because the perpetrator became the perpetrator because the victim had been drinking.”
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