By Jamie Forbes, CEO and Survivor I set out to write a series of blog posts about my experience as a survivor of sexual abuse. As I began the process, the words and the topics to write about poured out of me.  I realized there was a lot I wanted to cover as I began […]

By Amy Wheeler, VP of Memberships at Learning Courage September 15, 2021 As VP of Membership at Learning Courage and a survivor, my unwavering conviction for the need for Learning Courage was reinforced yesterday when listening to the courageous and painful testimony of four gymnasts in front of the Senate Judiciary. Our systems need to […]

By Elena Levin, Brown University, Class of 2022 In my first creative writing course as a freshman in college, I decided to write my final short story about sexual misconduct on a boarding school campus, exploring a world that I had become very familiar with during my four years attending a New England prep school. […]

Being sexually abused changed me in both profound and small ways. I believe that the abuse magnified existing, latent and emerging impulses and thoughts. I don’t believe it’s useful or even possible to identify how different I would be if I had not been abused. But I do think it’s important to acknowledge what consequences feel directly tied to the abuse I sustained.

In 2016, my second year as board chair at Milton Academy (MA), we launched a sexual misconduct investigation. There was no manual to guide us through that journey. There was no resource to answer our questions and help ensure that we were taking the right approach.

Making a public declaration that I had been abused in the 1980s as a student was terrifying. And yet it has also been one of the most meaningful and profound things I have done in my life. It has changed me in positive ways that I’ll share.