Hope Club Extends Support

Antonia Florence, staff writer

HOPE @ PIEDMONT is a new club at Piedmont Virginia Community College. Its function is to “Stand up against sexual violence and support any student who has endured an assault, is facing a pregnancy, or going through an emotional crisis while in college,” according to Club Advisor Jackie Fisher.

“Sexual Violence affects 1 in 16 men [and] 1 in 4 women during their college career. An average of 31% students become pregnant during their college education,” said Fisher.

HOPE meetings are open to all students, male and female. Many attendees have endured a sexual assault, an emotional crisis, are expecting a child, already have children or have a passion to support others.

Community resources are tapped by HOPE to provide support to those who may be in need. These include self-defense courses through the local sheriff’s department, assistance through SARA (Sexual Assault Resource Agency), and PCCA (Pregnancy Centers of Central VA) for those needing free maternity care or infant items, according to Fisher.

“In addition, we want to allow students to attend Green Dot Training to become active bystanders in the event of a sexual assault,” Fisher continued.

Green Dot is a system used as an intervention tool against domestic violence through the three D’s: Direct attention elsewhere, Delegate the responsibility to others, and create a Distraction to defuse a potentially dangerous situation. As an example, a student can go to two loud arguing students and ask where the admissions office is. One of the arguers tells the interrupting student, but the student asks if that person can lead them. After they turn the corner, one student levels with the other that it was a distraction to defuse the situation.

With the promise of new skills, the club meetings are relaxed and informative. “We have an awesome fun group of people and usually spend some time at the beginning of each meeting visiting and talking about our week. Then we either: work on an outreach project, hear from a speaker, do a workshop, or focus on a HOPE topic and ways to help fellow students. It’s a short one hour meeting, but we always leave smiling and full of pizza,” wrote Fisher. There is a wide variety of members and are currently leaning toward more male than female.

The club’s goal is to provide support and hope for any individual in need while spreading awareness on a student level. “Our club is not meant to come in between law enforcement protocols in any way and we work closely with the officials to ensure the safety of all students. PVCC refers students to SARA on the school website and provides them with the 24-hour hotline to call: 434-977-7273 or 434-295-7273,” said Fisher.

HOPE@PIEDMONT meets every other Tuesday, noon to 1 p.m. in the Pace Board Room, M814 in the Technology wing. For more information, please contact Abby Lannon, club president: atl20118@email.vccs.edu or HopeAtPiedmont@gmail.com