R-VOICE Center Trainings, Programs, and Events

The R-VOICE Center Ambassador Series is a way for staff and faculty to take on a leadership role in their own units and to be a bridge to the R-VOICE Center for students. As our flagship training series for staff and faculty, this two-part series includes a variety of techniques, education, and understanding on how we each can learn how to better support students, get them connected with critical resources, and learn more about how trauma affects survivors. 

Each person who is interested in becoming an Ambassador will attend Ambassador Training - Level 1 - Foundations - a two-hour training to learn practical skills on how they can be a resource to a survivor of power-based interpersonal violence, how to help them in times of crisis, what to say, and how to connect them with the R-VOICE Center. Additionally, Ambassadors will become a source of information for their coworkers, learn practical techniques on how to address victim-blaming behavior, and learn bystander intervention skills.

For staff and faculty who want to take their Ambassador status to the next level, they can attend Ambassador Training - Level 2 – A Trauma Informed Approach to Supporting Students: Understanding the Neurobiology and Impact of Trauma. If you have ever wondered why a good student is suddenly having difficulty with your course or is struggling to come to work, then attend this 2-hour workshop and learn how to help, understand, and support survivors and victims of trauma, and not retraumatize them in the process.

To request a training for your unit, or to find out about upcoming trainings, please contact Yvette Willson, Director, at ylw4@psu.edu.

The Clothesline Project is a national campaign started in 1990 to address the issue of interpersonal violence. During the public display, a clothesline is hung with shirts created by survivors of violence or in honor of someone who has experienced violence.

The R-VOICE Center displays the Clothesline Project annually. Penn State faculty, staff, or students interested in organizing a display can contact the center to discuss borrowing shirts.

Participate in the Virtual Clothesline Project

Campus community members are encouraged to participate in the R-VOICE Virtual Clothesline Project but submitting a t-shirt template to display words of support for survivors, stories of personal experiences, or messages taking a stand against power-based personal violence.

• Find templates and instructions on how to participate here

Understanding the Color Codes

Shirts are color-coded to highlight the form of violence and type of violence experienced by the individual making the shirt or experienced by the individual who the shirt is made in honor of. See the color code below:

• White: People who died as a result of violence
• Yellow: Survivors of physical assault and/or dating/domestic violence or abuse
• Red: Survivors of rape and/or sexual assault
• Pink: Survivors of rape and/or sexual assault
• Orange: Survivors of rape and/or sexual assault
• Blue: Survivors of incest or childhood sexual abuse
• Green: Survivors of incest or childhood sexual abuse
• Purple: Survivors of attacks due to perceived or actual sexual orientation
• Brown: Survivors of emotional, spiritual, or verbal abuse
• Grey: Survivors of emotional, spiritual, or verbal abuse
• Black: Those disabled as the result of an attack or assaulted because of a disability

Greeks CARE is one of the Peer Education programs affiliated with the R-VOICE Center. Greeks CARE facilitators lead a six week sexual assault prevention program offered to members of fraternities and sororities at Penn State. Participating organizations send representatives to weekly hour-long sessions, which focus on topics including supporting survivors, alcohol and consent, bystander intervention, and more. The program has expanded beyond the six week program to offering independent workshops as well. 

• You can request a workshop using the form linked here.

Greeks CARE, in collaboration with the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life, offers fraternity and sorority members an opportunity to examine the role they play in preventing sexual assault and creating a culture of support for survivors. The program is facilitated by R-VOICE Center staff and trained fraternity and sorority members.

Honoring Survival: Transforming the Spirit is an annual event designed to honor the strength and resiliency of survivors of sexual, emotional, and physical violence and those who support them in their healing process. Survivors and those who support them share their stories through poetry, storytelling, and music.

Love your Body Week is a collaborative campaign, organized by the R-VOICE Center, Health Promotion and Wellness, and other offices and departments across campus.

Held every fall, this week of programming is inspired by Love Your Body Day, organized by the National Organization for Women (N.O.W.), and Love Your Body Week, organized by the National Eating Disorders Association (N.E.D.A.).

Every day, in so many ways, the beauty industry and the media tell everyone, but especially women and girls, that being admired, envied, and desired based on their looks is a primary function of their worth and value. The Love Your Body Week campaign challenges the message that a person's value is best measured through their ability to embody current beauty standards. Events focus on body positivity, body neutrality, eating disorder prevention, and more.

"What were you wearing?" is an all too common and familiar question asked of victim survivors of sexual assault and violence by family, friends, community members, law enforcement, attorneys, and more. This question is rooted in victim-blaming culture and the rape myth that victim survivors provoke perpetrators due to their behavior, whether that be how they dress, if they drank or consumed drugs, or if they go back to the individual's apartment. The reality is nothing a victim survivor does invites sexual violence or assault.

The What Were You Wearing? Survivor Art Installation seeks to dispel this myth by collecting stories from our Penn State community members of what they were wearing when they experienced sexual violence and assault. Through this project, we hope to dismantle rape culture and promote consent culture and support for victim survivors in our community.

History of the Project

The Installation originated at the University of Arkansas. In 2013, Jen Brockman and Dr. Mary Wyandt-Hiebert created the project, inspired by Dr. Mary Simmerling's poem, What I Was Wearing. The first "What Were You Wearing?" Survivor Art Installation was then displayed in April 2014 at the University of Arkansas.

The R-VOICE Center hosted the first installment of the What Were You Wearing Exhibit at University Park in April 2018 as part of SVAP week and it spread to the other Penn State campuses hosting their own versions of the What Were You Wearing Installation.

Participate in the "What Were You Wearing?" Survivor Art Installation

Campus community members are encouraged to participate in the R-VOICE virtual installation but submitting their story anonymously using this digital form.

• Submit your story and a description of what you were wearing here