The UW-Eau Claire McIntyre Library is hosting the first “What They Were Wearing: A Collection of Survivor Stories” exhibit for the month of April, which is sexual assault awareness and prevention month. The exhibit is organized by the student chapter It’s On Us, a group with a mission to prevent sexual violence on campus.

It’s On Us is a nationwide organization that was started by the Obama-Biden administration in 2014. The nonprofit program provides training for students to become peer-educators on sexual assault prevention.

According to the It’s On Us website, “It’s On Us is on a mission to build the movement to combat campus sexual assault by giving students of all identities, especially young men, the tools to address the cultural norms at the root of sexual harm. We do this by activating the largest student organizing program of its kind in grassroots awareness and prevention education programs.”

Fourth-year criminal justice student and UW-Eau Claire’s It’s On Us president, Margaret Evert, started a chapter at UW-Milwaukee during her sophomore year. When she transferred to UW-Eau Claire, she saw the opportunity to restart another chapter as sexual violence prevention is important to her.

Evert said that sexual violence training is not taken seriously on college campuses. Typically, for orientations, first-year students have to take an online course or attend a training event. Evert said that students don’t take it seriously and often only do the training for completion.

“I think a huge part of it is that continuing the conversation past just one training or one online seminar, because consent should be this continual practice that we’re working on in our lives,” Evert said.

The exhibit is inspired by the poem “What I Was Wearing” by Mary Simmerling. The poem inspired thousands of exhibits across the US and is a space that sexual violence survivors have opened in person and online to websites such as Dove Center, Rise Now and the Susan B. Anthony Project, with pages of personal stories and images of clothing items.

The purpose of this exhibit is to debunk the myth that a persons outfit is connected to the reason behind sexual violence and expose the truth to what survivors were actually wearing.

“The outfits in this exhibit are 103 in total, representing the 1.3 billion survivors of sexual violence across the globe. Each outfitted figure represents more than 10 million survivors around the world,” according to Rise Now.

The exhibit provides an opportunity for sexual violence survivors on the UW-Eau claire campus to submit clothing, art pieces or memorabilia to share their stories. According to the exhibit’s advertising, survivors can present their pieces anonymously or attached with their name, giving them the agency in how they want their contribution displayed.

Fourth-year psychology student and treasurer of It’s On Us, River Rolfes, collaborated with Professor Mia Kelly’s victimology class this semester to assist them in interpreting survivors’ stories that didn’t have their own clothes to provide and making pieces for them.

The It’s On Us chapter collaborated with the UW-Eau Claire Center for Awareness of Sexual Assault (CASA) and Counseling Services to provide information for survivors who are not ready to tell their stories yet. 

Evert said CASA directly helped with providing trauma-informed content warnings around campus to inform visitors before seeing the pieces.

The chapter provided pamphlets with local resources and information for visitors who realize they might need some support. During their opening reception on April 7, Counseling Services provided a therapist to ensure that support was accessible.

“There’s space for survivors who may not be ready to share their story or how to do that,” Rolfes said. “We have so many resources that are going to be at the exhibit for them to see and have.”

For those interested in visiting the exhibit, it will be on display until April 30 on the first floor of the McIntyre Library. For all updates on upcoming events and getting involved with It’s On Us, follow them on Instagram and Blugold Connect.

Hattie Goethals can be reached at [email protected].