St. Edward’s University has created an event that will teach students how to respond if witnessing an instance of relationship violence.

The university offers a variety of events throughout the month of October, Relationship Violence Awareness Month, and is introducing its newest program: the Bystander Behavior Training, which will take place Oct. 27 at 7 p.m. in Doyle Hall 134.

“People witness [relationship violence] and don’t do anything,” Wellness and Outreach Coordinator Peter Erickson said.

The Bystander Training focus will explore each participant’s desire to be a helper. It will also define bystander, outline the major barriers to intervening, reveal participant’s concerns, and provide training on how to intervene, according to the training’s program.

The Health and Counseling Center started the Relationship Violence Awareness Month by creating the Red Flag Campaign, where red flag posters were distributed across campus encouraging students to intervene when they see warning signs of partner’s violence.

“We wanted to do visual things to alert people,” Erickson said.

For women who had been raped and/or sexually assaulted, nine of 10 offenders were known to the victim (boyfriend, ex-boyfriend, classmate, friend, acquaintance or co-worker), according to a research by Action Alliance, Virginia Sexual and Domestic Violence.

So far, the events from Sexual Assault Awareness Month in April and the previous relationship violence events had a great turn out, and they are hoping for more students to go and participate in these events.

“I think [the awareness month] is necessary, because even though violence around campus isn’t high that doesn’t mean it can’t be,” junior Rishi Vaswani said.

The events focus on making people aware of the issue, not only on campus but off-campus as well. Even though these events don’t prevent people from acting violent and assaulting women,  the  organizers want to make sure that every student at St. Edward’s has the necessary information in case they find themselves in those situations.

Besides the new event, the Health and Counseling Center also offers the following:

•”Everyone Wear Red” Day on Oct. 20. Stop by Ragsdale Lawn between 12:30 and 2:30 p.m. to get a free shirt, if you are wearing red.

•Violence Against Women Around the Globe Informational Tabletop on Oct. 25 from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Fondren Lawn, where you can win a $50 Target gift card.

•Hilltopper Peer Health Education Relationship Violence Information Tabletop on Oct. 26 between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. at the Ragsdale Lawn. Students will receive a free gift if they are wearing red.

“These events are very beneficial. It gets the word out on what is going on and what we can do about it,” Vaswani said.

All these events are possible because the Health and Counseling Center and Erickson applied for a grant to the Alice Kleberg Reynolds Foundation and received $10,000 to create several awareness months, including the one on relationship violence.

Erickson said that he applies for the grant for the past three years, and in order to have more chances of getting the fund, new ideas need to be provided. For example, the Dynamics event was new last year for the Sexual Assault Awareness Month and was implemented for the Relationship Violence Month as well.

“Any time you are able to provide information about issues, it always makes a good impact,” Erickson said.

The Health and Counseling Center is planning on sending National College Association Health Surveys next spring to find out the impact that these events are having on students.

All St. Edward’s students, faculty and staff are invited to go to the events and provide feedback to the Health Center so that they can improve the awareness month events and make them more appealing to what students want to know.

For more information about the events, contact Peter Erickson at [email protected] or visit the Health and Counseling website. For assistance with personal issues, visit the Health Center and make a counseling appointment with one of the staff members.