Our program this week will be Cheyenne Quilter, a senior Cadet at the United States Military Academy at West Point. Cadet Quilter is a psychology major with an environmental engineer track that has a passion for gender equality, international policy reform focusing on women’s and children’s rights and policy reform for rights of victims of sexual violence. Her passions led her to work in Nepal, teaching children how to utilize their confidence to speak up against gender inequality through positive psychology skills from a curriculum she created with the Center for Enhanced Performance, at West Point. She's got a fascinating story to tell!
While in Nepal, Cheyenne had the opportunity to work directly with mothers, children, and government officials as she talked about the importance of dignified menstruation. Cheyenne’s experiences abroad and within West Point inspired her to create a mentor program for Middle school girls within the Hudson Valley schools which pairs up a female cadet with a middle school girl and they complete a postive psychology workbook together. Cheyenne also started West Point’s Athena Rising Council, which provides bridges of communications between females at each of the service academies (United States Military Academy, Coast Guard Academy, Air Force Academy, Naval Academy, and Merchant Marine Academy), helping to identify common issues and create solutions that are most effective across service academies. Within the United States Military Academy, Cheyenne’s passion for victim advocacy led her to work with West Point academy leadership on a Return to Health Policy for cadets who have been sexually assaulted, to ensure survivors have access to both cognitive and physical resources needed for effective healing. Cheyenne’s passion for policy reform for victim’s rights and gender equality also allowed her to attend the Munich Security Conference while studying abroad in France, where she met with the NATO Special Representative to the Secretary General on Women, Peace, and Security and the Commanding General’s advisor on Interagency Women Peace and Security Program Manager. During her experience at NATO, Cheyenne had the chance to discuss the integration of women within the military from an international standpoint and the process of developing policies with a focus on victim advocacy and gender equality within NATO. Passionate about victims’ rights, Cheyenne spent her summer engaged in virtual research with the University of New Hampshire’s Prevention Innovation Research Center analyzing the effectiveness of university sexual assault policies in comparisons to concussion policies. Cheyenne also worked with the Department of Defense Sexual Assault Prevention Response Office analyzing current DoD policies on the Sexual Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention training, focusing on revisions to the initial cognitive care training. Though COVID-19 created obstacles for Cheyenne’s senior year, she was still able to work as the Brigade Executive Officer for Trust (West Point’s peer led sexual assault and sexual harassment prevention program) where she works with the academy’s Superintendent, Commandant, and Dean to implement programs, campaigns, and response efforts for cadets within West Point. Cheyenne is currently researching with NATO and USAID to create a standard operating procedure/ policy recommendation for how allied regions need to handle sexual violence when they see other regions using it during conflict. In Cheyenne’s free time, she continues to pursue her yoga certification specializing in healing trauma through yoga, which she hopes to implement within the Trust Program for West Point’s Corps of Cadets to utilize.