MC receives grant from DOJ to create PAVE program

Maryville College has recently received a grant from the United States Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women worth $300,000 to institute a Preventing Assault and Violence through Education (or PAVE) program on campus.

According to Dr. Melanie Tucker, the Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students and the primary investigator of the grant, Maryville College has reported low rates of on-campus crime, but she concedes that such incidents often go unreported on colleges campuses all across the country. 

Director of Student Services, Jessica Boor said this grant aims to, “enhance student awareness of resources related to preventing and responding to gender-based violence like sexual assault, domestic violence, and stalking … it will help coordinate efforts on and off campus.” In addition to its stated goal of awareness, the grant is meant to make methods of preventing violence available and inclusive for all Maryville College students.

“Ultimately this [grant] came about out of a desire to better serve students,” Boor said. “The college is one of only 50 entities across the country to receive this grant through a very competitive process.”

Money from the PAVE grant will go towards training, services, protocols, and education concerning the previously stated issues. There are to be no changes in responsibilities for faculty and staff. Rather, there will be supplemental support accessible to them in areas concerning assault and violence through the use of workshops and specific training for instructors and their classes.

The college is also working to establish a peer educator program, with the aid of the PAVE grant, that will help create innovative educational materials for students about violence prevention.

Thanks to PAVE, Jessica Boor will be stepping down from her current role as Title IX Coordinator and into the new role of full-time Prevention Education Coordinator—the only new staff position created out of the implementation of the grant as of Nov. 1, 2019.

 Her goal as Prevention Education Coordinator will be to work with peers across campus to ensure that prevention efforts are “meeting or exceeding VAWA (Violence Against Women Act) compliance requirements.”  It will no longer be the primary objective of the Title IX Coordinator to lead prevention efforts, and the position will be moved to another placement on the Maryville College campus.