Sexual Assault Awareness Month

Proclamation

April 2020

In the United States, April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month (SAAM). The goal of SAAM is 
to raise public awareness about sexual violence and educate communities on how to prevent it. 
SAAM calls attention to the fact that sexual harassment, assault, and abuse are is widespread 
and impact every person in this community.

Rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment harm our community, and statistics show one in 
five women and one in 67 men will be raped at some point in their lives (Smith et al., 2017).

Child sexual abuse prevention must be a priority to confront the reality that one in six boys 
and one in four girls will experience sexual assault before age 18 (Dube et al., 2005).

On campus, one in five women and one in 16 men are sexually assaulted during their time in 
college (Krebs et al., 2007).

This year, SAAM is celebrating its 19th anniversary. The theme for this year’s campaign, 
“I Ask” helps empower all of us to put consent into practice and shares the message that 
asking for consent is a normal and necessary part of sex.

I join advocates and communities across the country in taking action to prevent sexual 
violence. 

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month and each day of the year is an opportunity to 
create change for the future.

Dube, S. R., Anda, R. F., Whitfield, C. L., Brown, D. W., Felitti, V. J., Dong, M., & 
Giles, W. H. (2005). Long-term consequences of childhood sexual abuse by gender of victim. 
American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 28(5), 430–438. 
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2005.01.015 

Krebs, C. P., Lindquist, C. H., Warner, T. D., Fisher, B. S., & Martin, S. L. (2007) 
The Campus Sexual Assault (CSA) Study (NCJ 221153). National Criminal Justice Reference Service. 
https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/221153.pdf

Smith, S. G., Chen, J., Basile, K. C., Gilbert, L. K., Merrick, M. T., Patel, N., Walling, 
M., & Jain, A. (2017). The National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (NISVS): 
2010-2012 state report. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease 
Control and Prevention. https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/NISVS-StateReportBook.pdf

© 2020 National Sexual Violence Resource Center. All rights reserved.