This month marks National Relationship Violence Awareness month. Throughout October, the Health & Counseling Center is sponsoring a variety of seminars, tabletops, projects, guest speakers and panels to raise awareness about this growing issue.

One in every four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime and an estimated 1.3 million women are victims of physical assault by an intimate partner each year, according to the National Institute of Justice and the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.

Associate Director of the Health & Counseling Center Beth Charrier said that awareness needs to be raised as soon as possible.

“About a third of relationships at a college level have some sort of violence in them, so it happens a lot more than people are aware of—that’s part of why we’re doing awareness raising,” Charrier said.

In 2013 there were four on-campus reports of dating violence, according to the Clery Crime Statistics in the university’s 2014 Annual Security and Fire Safety Report.

“Previously campuses didn’t have to report relationship violence incidents, but (the Campus Sexual Violence Elimination Act) actually made that a requirement for Clery reporting. It’s one of those things that campuses need to be more transparent about,” Charrier said.

With the recent events that have unfolded around the NFL, more awareness is being brought to relationship violence awareness.

“Everyone needs to see this as part of their responsibility, and I think one of the things that’s happening in NFL culture is that they’ve sort of turned a blind eye often to some of these things, and so they’re getting busted for it at this point,” Charrier said. “That’s bringing awareness, which is good, but it certainly needs to happen long before that.”

Hilltoppers Peer Health Educator Cheyenne Rohmann believes it’s important to get the information out there and to educate students about these issues.

“A lot of people think and have that mindset of, ‘Oh it will never happen to me. It will never happen to someone I know,’ but really you never know, and so it’s just so good to make students aware that these are things that happen and really just provide them with educational resources to help them,” Rohmann said.

As part of the “Red Flag Poster Series,” which began Oct. 1, red and green flags have been put up across campus to “encourage students to intervene when they see a warning sign of intimate partner violence in a friend’s relationship.”

“We want to reduce the number (of victims) by having people know what to look out for and paying attention to the signs and knowing how to get help when they need to,” Charrier said.

On Oct. 15, Relationship Violence Awareness Day, all members of the St. Edward’s University community are invited to wear a red article of clothing to show their commitment to creating healthier relationships.

Charrier is hosting an interactive simulation in Mabee Ballrooms A and B on Oct. 20 at 6:30 p.m. This event will help participants better understand why leaving an abusive partner is not always as easy as it sounds.

A full schedule of the month’s events is posted around campus; look for the flyer with the red flag on it. This information can also be found online on the Health & Counseling Center’s news blog.

For more information about Relationship Violence Awareness month, contact the Health & Counseling Center’s Wellness and Outreach Services Coordinator Pete Erickson at (512) 464-8821 or [email protected].