Photo By Sgt. 1st Class Jacob Kohrs | Dr. Carolyn M. West, a professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of...... read more read more
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Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.- An ominous voice comes over the speakers. “I am the ulcer in the belly of your organization, the degradation of your seven core values…. I’m sexual harassment and assault; I’m a combat-minimizer. If you can’t win the war against me, you’ll never be able to defeat your countries enemies.” As the spoken word poem by Chief Warrant Officer 3 Edward Wilson, finishes, the room is silent.
The senior and junior leaders of both 17th Field Artillery Brigade and 201st Expeditionary Military Intelligence Brigade come together as one for a summit to discuss and understand ways to prevent a culture of sexual harassment and assault within their ranks, the military, and the world around them.
“What we would like to do is ensure that this is an opportunity were we can wrap our arms around S.H.A.R.P. as a program, and weave it into something that we do day in and day out as a part of our lives.” said Lt. Col. James Dunwoody, the deputy commanding officer of 17th FA Bde. “It has to be a program where the tenets are fully embraced by the individuals that have the capacity to effect a change in our organization.”
The S.H.A.R.P. program, or the sexual harassment/assault response and prevention program, reinforces the Army’s commitment to end sexual harassment and assault through policies that help build awareness and prevention through training, education and accountability.
“This is part of the S.H.A.R.P. training,” said Dr. Carolyn M. West, a professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Washington, Tacoma, Wash. “It is a refresher course to give people some additional information about what we know about sexual assault in the military and some hands on information on what they can do to make culture changes.”
West continued saying that she really would like leaders to know they are the ones who are able to set the stage for changing the culture within their units. It is not beyond their ability and power to make those changes.
“It is largely this group (of senior leaders) that can affect change,” Dunwoody agreed.
The training was broken into two groups; the senior leaders: Sgt. 1st Class and above and the junior leaders: Spc. to Staff Sgt. and lieutenants.
“I really want the junior leaders to understand consent,” said West. “I am going to talk about the neurobiology of trauma and how perpetrators operate within the units. I want them to start grappling with hard conversations around social media, revenge porn, and how consent seems so easy to determine but it is not an easy topic.”
At the end of the training there was a panel of experts and junior enlisted soldiers to help both the senior and junior leaders understand how to better speak, teach and mentor. The leaders in both units understand what it is to be in the junior ranks and know that these junior soldiers are able to see and hear more of what their peers are understanding in the messages and training that they are given.
The leaders want to insure that the messages and training is relevant to these soldiers.
“There is a gap between the senior leaders and junior soldiers,” said Spc. Jimmy Lerma, a soldier from 5th Battalion, 3rd Field Artillery, 17th FA Bde. “They are using us as the roots, or most direct resource as to what is going on, whether it is the work environment or living environment. I feel like this went really well and there will be a change in the way that we are taught and mentored.”
With readiness being the military’s top priority, sexual harassment and sexual assault have no place within the military, the Army, or within the companies and batteries of each of these units.
“This is an opportunity,” said Dunwoody, “to engage in a discussion and, one way or another, help us embrace the S.H.A.R.P. tenets. So we may apply it in every aspect of everything we do.”
| Date Taken: | 03.05.2018 |
| Date Posted: | 03.21.2018 12:26 |
| Story ID: | 270111 |
| Location: | JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, WA, US |
| Web Views: | 125 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Coming together to combat sexual assault, by SFC Jacob Kohrs, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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