2018 Sexual Assault Campus Climate Survey

In the spring of 2018, all students at Pomona College 18 years of age and older were invited to respond to the Sexual Assault Campus Climate Survey (SACCS) developed by the Higher Education Data Sharing Consortium (HEDS).  More than 13,000 students across the country and 45 institutions took part in the survey this year, including The Claremont Colleges.  Results for Pomona and all five undergraduate colleges in Claremont are accessible via links on the right-hand menu.  This marks the second coordinated administration of this survey across Claremont as part of our collective commitment to strengthen the campus climate for all students. 

Survey Background

The survey is designed to measure students' perceptions of campus climate, the prevalence and nature of unwanted sexual contact and sexual assault, perceptions of how the institution addresses and responds to sexual assault, and the specific details of the context and disclosure of sexual assault.   Since our last administration of this survey in 2015, a set of questions on bystander intervention has been added; the 2018 version also included a set of local (Claremont-specific) questions on stalking and dating/domestic violence.  More information about this initiative and a sample of the core survey instrument are available from the HEDS website.

2018 SACCS Respondents

Together with our peers in Claremont, Pomona is committed to the highest level of transparency in the publication of results, while protecting the anonymity of survey respondents.  Care was taken by HEDS to prevent the identification of respondents, including removing variables from the data files returned to participating institutions for analysis. Many analyses make comparisons between "White only" and "Did not select white only;" among "Women," "Men" and "Nonbinary or no response;" and between "Heterosexual" and "Selected sexual orientation but not heterosexual." These labels reflect the deprecation of variables included in the files prepared by HEDS; the recoding and collapsing of various demographic variables was done to preserve the anonymity of students who may be members of small groups. 

Overall, 364 students participated, for a Pomona College response rate of 22%.  The characteristics of Pomona respondents are summarized below:

Additional information about the survey, including its methodology and limitations, is provided in the FAQ.  Results from the 2015 administration of the survey also are available; these are not directly comparable to the 2018 results (see FAQ).