April 02, 2018
Monday, April 2, 2018
LANSING, Mich. — April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month, and Gov. Rick Snyder and First Lady Sue Snyder are urging all Michiganders to raise awareness and pledge to help change the culture surrounding sexual assault. For the month of April, Michiganders can sign “MI Pledge” to initiate statewide culture change and support sexual assault survivors.
“It’s critical that as a society, we talk less and listen better to the voices of sexual assault survivors,” Gov. Rick Snyder said. “We can all play a part in changing our culture and helping to prevent sexual assault. I urge all Michiganders to sign this pledge and help raise awareness for this important issue during the month of April and beyond.”
Gov. Snyder has proclaimed April as “Sexual Assault Awareness Month” to draw attention to the widespread impact of sexual violence. Statistics indicate that one in five women and one in 50 men will be raped at some point in their lives.
“For too long, the voices of survivors have been silenced,” said First Lady Sue Snyder. “It’s time for us as a society to say, ‘enough is enough’ and take active steps not only to raise awareness, but to help prevent sexual assault from happening in the first place. I look forward to continuing this important work in our state and hope all Michiganders will join me in pledging to support survivors and help prevent sexual assault.”
Michiganders can visit www.endcampussexualassault.com to sign the pledge to listen to the voices of survivors, help prevent sexual assault and change the culture.
Michigan is a leader in the fight to end campus sexual assault. Through the First Lady’s Inform. Empower. Prevent. Let’s End Campus Sexual Assault initiative, three statewide awareness summits have been held and $1.6 million has been allocated toward the Campus Sexual Assault Grant Program to fund sexual assault awareness and prevention programs on campuses.
Last year the First Lady created a campus sexual assault workgroup to develop resource materials for sexual assault survivors. The workgroup unveiled and distributed 500 handbooks to attendees at the third annual Inform. Empower. Prevent. summit on Sept. 25 and launched the website www.michigan.gov/CampusSexualAssault.
Michigan colleges and universities and their community partners can order up to 250 copies of the handbook at a time by going to the MDHHS clearinghouse website and clicking the sexual assault link. To date, 15,312 resource handbooks have been delivered around Michigan.
Click here to view the proclamation.
To watch a video message from the Governor and First Lady about Sexual Assault Awareness Month, click here.
To learn more about the First Lady’s Inform. Empower. Prevent. initiative, visit www.endcampussexualassault.com.
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