Sexual Assault Prevention

We all have a role to play in making UB a safe environment to live, learn, and explore.  Being an empowered bystander can help us move from standing by to stepping up.  It’s not always easy, but each of us can help in our own way, and we can learn skills to help in safer and more effective ways.

Helping is about five separate decisions:

1. Notice the Event: Be aware of your surroundings, and watch for warning signs.
2. Interpret the Event as a Problem: If something is unclear, clear it up. Don’t just brush it off.
3. Assume Personal Responsibility: Don’t assume someone else will help.  
4. Know How To Help: Learn direct and indirect ways to help.
5. Implement the Help: Choose the safest, most appropriate strategy and step up.

1. Direct: Directly address the problem behavior.   
2. Distract: Anything that safely distracts someone enough to discontinue the problem behavior.
3. Delegate: If you feel uncomfortable or unsafe intervening, delegate the intervention to someone more appropriate. 

1. It’s the right thing to do
2. I would want someone to help me in that situation
3. Someone needed help
4. People should look out for each other
5. So the situation wouldn’t escalate 

Help make UB a safer place to live, work, and learn. Take the training to be an empowered bystander or join our nationally-recognized team of student leaders.

Take our Peer Education Course, UBE 110, and become a Nationally Certified Health & Wellness Peer Educator.

Request a Bystander Intervention Training for your club, organization, or area, or attend our next scheduled training.

• NYS Domestic & Sexual Violence 24-hour Hotline  1-800-492-6906
• Domestic Violence Shelter 24-hour Hotline (716) 884-6000

If you or someone you know needs support dealing with the emotional, physical or legal challenges of surviving a sexual assault or other unwanted sexual experience, we can help you.