(Australia-NewsWire.Com, November 14, 2012 ) Melbourne, Australia- DePaul University is no longer the most sexually unhealthy in the country, according to Trojan Sexual Health Report Card.
Last year DePaul was at the bottom of a 141-school list as the most unhealthy school. Now the school is number 114, and the school hopes to continue to rise to higher numbers.
The rankings are based upon sexual health services available to students. Schools are graded on 11 criteria, including contraceptive availability, STI testing, sexual assault programs, and sexual health information that is available to students.
The major issues that still persist at DePaul are the contraceptive availability, as well as “hours of operation of health services.
The university does not have a health services center at all, with only a SAGE medical group, which is available to students living in the residence hall.
Any major health services available would be a surprise to students.
“If they have added any services, I don’t know what they are,” said junior marketing major Brian Van Meter. “I’m on campus all the time, so I definitely would have heard about them.”
“I haven’t heard of any new services,” said senior psychology major Farhana Rahim. “I think it’s a little ridiculous how few services we have available, even outside of sexual health.”
The Dean of Student’s Office was unavailable for comment.
The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the U of I’s McKinley’s Health Center has an entire page devoted to “Healthy Sexuality” and the school encourages students to follow Wendy Maltz’s “CERTS” model of healthy sexuality. The “CERTS” model encourages safety requirements including consent, equality, respect, trust, and safety before engaging in sexual activity.
Speaking on DePaul’s system, Rahim said: “I think we need to do a lot more to promote safe sex. It’s good that we are going up in the rankings, but 114 is still not good enough,” said Rahim. “As a Catholic university I don’t think we can ever expect to actually be number one on the list, but we definitely need to do a lot better.”
“I think it’s ridiculous that we don’t pass out condoms,” said Van Meter. “This is a college, and whether or not it is against our ‘values’ as a university, kids are going to have sex.”
Though the improvement is a good sign, DePaul still has a long way to go to be considered a quality school when it comes to sexual health.
About MarieStopes.org.au: MarieStopes.org.au (http://www.mariestopes.org.au/) provides information for individuals seeking family planning or personal health services. Browse the plethora of information regarding personal and sexual health needs at the Marie Stopes website.