As a student at Mishawaka High School, I was sexually assaulted by a fellow student-athlete at the home of a coach.  Afterward, I was subjected to sexual harassment on school grounds by this student as well as other peers.  This harassment included social media posts jokingly showing him in class with a nametag identifying him as a "#rapist", as well as another student commenting that "rape is not the only thing he knows how to do".  He also shared child sexual abuse images of what he did to me with other students while at school.

I, along with my mom, reported these and several other incidents to the school's administration, with pictures and messages as evidence.  However, the accused student faced no consequences, and I was forced to obtain a protective order to remove him from our shared classes.  Despite that, the school took no measures to remove him from other shared areas of the school, such as the lunchroom.  I ultimately moved to virtual learning, since I was unable to concentrate at school.

Even worse, school district employees, along with fellow cheerleaders and parents, did not want me at games where the accused student competed, so they cut me from the cheerleading team.  But he was allowed to continue competing despite evidence of his harassment.

The mishandling of reports of sexual harassment and assault has been an ongoing problem at Mishawaka High School.  The school newspaper, The Alltold, published an article regarding a similar situation in 2020, highlighting the school's lack of proper procedures.  It appears nothing has improved.  My mom and I both filed Title IX complaints with the Office of Civil Rights. Please help me along with the current and future student body at Mishawaka by signing this petition to demand that Mishawaka High School take the following actions to prevent others from having to go through similar harassment and retaliation that I experienced:

1) Provide annual, mandatory in-person Title IX training at each local school for all employees and students that defines and provides examples of covered offenses, outlines how and to whom offenses should be reported, details rights and options available through the Title IX process, shares available counseling and advocacy resources, and trains students on how to seek and receive consent as part of prevention efforts.

2) Provide annual, mandatory in-person trauma-informed training for all school employees and school resources officers at each local school before each fall semester.

3) Publish an annual Title IX compliance report on its website detailing efforts to train employees and students and providing data on how many reports were received, investigated, and resulted in findings of responsibility.

4) Sponsor student organizations that provide peer education on sexual harassment and violence awareness and prevention, Title IX rights and options, and prevention topics such as healthy relationships and consent.

5) Retain an outside investigator to review allegations that Dean Huppert, Sherry Keyser, Erica Peebles, Brie Phend, Jimena “Mena” Mason, Mary Houser, Sarah Hickle, and Jessica Mann discriminated, harassed, and retaliated against me.

6) Reimburse my legal, medical, and educational expenses.