Friday's rally against sexual assault began modestly, with 14 people and a stack of cardboard signs on Old Main steps.

By the end of the event, the crowd had ballooned greatly in size to include students, spectators and Penn State administrators.

Men and women gathered to show their distress about the string of sexual assaults in the Snyder Hall dormitory on Sept. 10.

"No means no! Yes means yes! Wherever we go! However we dress!" they chanted, marching in a circle.

Last Wednesday, police charged Hung Truong, a junior who was a resident of Snyder Hall until last week, with entering 13 unlocked dorm rooms and assaulting six women. Truong is awaiting a preliminary hearing.

Although none of the assault victims spoke at the rally, two of them were present, one of the victims said afterward.

Those who rallied said assault victims are too often blamed for what happens to them, especially in this case.

"Locked or unlocked, stop blaming the victim," read one of their signs.

At the rally, Amanda Cosgrove (junior-speech communications) addressed the crowd from the point of view of a rape victim. She said she'd been raped several years ago.

"I can't explain how that makes you feel to be violated like that," Cosgrove said.

Members of the Undergraduate Student Government, as well as some of the same students who have been recently fighting Penn State's Office of Judicial Affairs, made up a part of the crowd on the steps.

"Where is Graham?" some of them chanted, in an appeal to university President Graham Spanier.

Spanier was attending his daughter's out-of-town soccer match at the time, said Penn State spokesperson Bill Mahon. None of the rally organizers contacted Spanier's office ahead of time, Mahon said, so Spanier didn't know about the event until it was announced in Friday morning's newspaper.

Terrell Jones, Penn State's vice provost for education equity, attended the rally. Jones stood as a spectator as the demonstrators grated the university's administration for not attending the rally.

Later, he walked over and joined the demonstrators on the steps.

"I've read all the signs, and I'm in agreement with every sign I've read," Jones said.

"I'm not sure it's logical to suggest that because the president isn't here, he's not supportive," he added.

The students who organized the rally will be meeting Wednesday evening to discuss how Penn State can make the campus safer for women.

At the rally, students already had plenty of ideas.

Two suggestions included expanding the Center for Women Students and holding more classes to educate men about sexual violence.

"People need to be educated about simple things like what's right and what's wrong," Cosgrove said.