If you haven’t read the newspaper or have had your head in a sandbox for the past few months, there have been three reported alleged sexual attacks on campus.

Three suspects were arrested last week for an alleged gang-style rape of a female in Rivers Hall. Just a few weeks ago, police responded to a report of another gang-style rape in a university apartment. Additionally, last September a female was reportedly attacked in the parking deck and raped by an unknown suspect.

In my opinion, one rape (or sexual assault) is too many. Many students, faculty and staff are calling for more campus policing, additional security measures and a re-evaluation of residence hall policies.

All of these are excellent places to start, but we need to do something as a community. We need to call for action. We need solid answers.

We, as UNA community members, should band together to put an end to the sexual violence that has been exhibited on our campus. This is our campus, and we have to take ownership of it.

During a recent open forum on campus, officials from Student Affairs and the university police department discussed the latest reports of rape on campus. Although the attendees asked great questions, I feel as though their questions were not answered and their concerns were not addressed.

Yes, the university police department added reserve officers, trained a female officer to investigate rapes and beefed up patrols after September’s reported rape, but I don’t think it’s enough.

The Flor-Ala reported in September that the university police department was shopping for cameras to be placed in the parking deck, but I have yet to see the first crew putting these cameras up in the deck. Action must be taken to prevent these types of crimes from happening on our campus.

Sure, all college campuses are going to have their occasional burglaries and robberies. Hell, they all typically have occasional cases of alcohol and drug violations, but UNA is not known for rapes and sexual assaults happening this often.

Campus security needs to be stepped up even more. I may be speaking too soon, but I would be willing to pay more in tuition to be safe on campus. We already pay a good deal of tuition, but if I was charged $200 more a semester so that additional officers could be hired and cameras could be placed around campus, I would write a check tomorrow.

Students on this campus get in an uproar over The Flor-Ala running an article on sex but don’t react when we have to run stories each week on sexual assaults happening quite often.

The response to incidents like this should be of a nurturing nature and make the victim feel like people are standing beside them to help the campus and victim get back to a sense of normalcy.

The UNA community needs to unite against sexual violence and especially violence against women. No longer should it be seen as OK to be violent toward other human beings.