Two thoughts ran through her head: I could turn and run away, or I could try to get in the car and lock the door.

Chalifoux, now a zoology senior, chose the second option, and the man’s hand grazed her head as she rushed into the car. He pounded on the window before giving up and walking away.

The 21-year-old said she doesn’t want to think about what could have happened if she hadn’t made it safely into the car, and the incident is part of what prompted her to take Kinesiology 106V, MSU’s self-defense class.

“What if next time I don’t respond that way? What if I had turned and ran?” she said. “It’s important (to learn self-defense) because I don’t want this to happen again.”

Developing the program

People have different reasons for wanting to learn self-defense, but most will agree that it’s not only educational and important for safety reasons, but it is empowering to learn and teach it.

Some students who take KIN 106V decide they want to further their self-defense education by teaching other students through MSU’s Self Defense for Women program, sponsored by the Department of Intramural Sports and Recreative Services and by the Women’s Resource Center.

The program was started in the early ’90s by Jayne Schuiteman, an associate professor in the Center for Gender in Global Context — formerly Women, Gender and Social Justice — and the Women’s Resource Center.

As a graduate student, Schuiteman was teaching the self-defense kinesiology class and had resident mentors who took the course and often asked her to give a one-hour crash course to students on their floor.

“It reached the point where I probably could’ve been in the residence halls for two programs a day, Monday through Thursday,” Schuiteman said.

Around that time, MSU was going to receive extra money from the state to be used for issues regarding student safety, so Schuiteman and a couple of others make a proposal to expand the program using that money.

Schuiteman knew she eventually would finish her graduate program and there needed to be more people to teach the classes, so students were trained as facilitators.

“It seemed to me that peer facilitation of these skills made a lot of sense,” she said.

Today, student facilitators are trained to teach two-hour self-defense programs to other students, often dorm residents and sororities. The first hour focuses on sexual assault statistics and the second on physical strategy.

Right now, there are six facilitators and another six in training.

Schuiteman said she knew there was a need and desire for this type of program because students want to be safe, but it also can be fun.

“Taking a self-defense class, if it’s done well, is fun,” she said. “It’s empowering … My goal was to have these kinds of workshops be available to whoever wanted to take part, and they would be high-quality workshops.”

Empowering students and facilitators

On Saturday, five new facilitators met in the judo room of IM Sports-West to train with Jane Nelson, who began as a facilitator not long after the program started.

It was the group’s third training session, but the first where the students started to learn physical self-defense.

One of the techniques the group learned during the three hours of instruction was how to pull out of an attacker’s grasp, which left most of them with red wrists from repeating the exercise.

They also discussed the benefits of using your voice as a form of self-defense.

Nelson got her start in the program much like most of her trainees — she took the kinesiology class when she was an undergraduate student at MSU in the 1980s.

“I really enjoyed (the class),” she said. “But at the same time, it made me realize how unaware I was of things and how I felt if something actually happened that I was totally unprepared to actually do anything about it.”

New facilitators receive 16 hours of training from Nelson, in which they learn more than the information they teach in the two-hour programs, including a solid background in physical defense, but also an extensive background in statistics about assault and other forms of violence.

“I find that students who want to become facilitators want to empower other students, but they also want to deepen their own learning and so that’s what we want for them as well,” Nelson said. “We want them to get a lot out of it personally, as well as professionally, and to be able to empower other students.”

This idea is part of why Michelle Harkins has stayed with the program for the past three years.

The 2007 MSU graduate is the program’s acting coordinator, while Angela Michael, who normally facilitates it, is on maternity leave.

Harkins said learning self-defense has made her more assertive.

“It’s empowering to know that if there ever is an emergency and you need to pull this stuff out, you have it,” she said.

Rachel Ray, a current facilitator, said she feels satisfied when students take her two-hour class and say they feel like they learned something from it.

“Even if they don’t remember every single move, I like to feel like they’ve given me something,” the communication junior said.

Prevention tactics

According to Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, or RAINN, one in six women are victims of sexual assault, along with one in 33 men, and according to the National Crime Victimization Survey, there were 272,350 victims of rape, attempted rape or sexual assault in 2006.

“We want to recognize that sexual assault in particular, compared to other forms of violence, is much more directed toward women than it is toward men,” Nelson said. “We really wanted to acknowledge that in the title of the program as well as in the information we give.”

But even so, the Self Defense for Women program is not exclusively for women — two of the new trainees are men, which Nelson said encourages men to attend, and it’s helpful to get their perspective.

She said the program addresses sexual assault risks for men, but the main focus still is on college-aged women, who make up most of the audience.

John Hoard, a criminal justice junior training to be a facilitator, said he didn’t know how many assaults happen before starting training.

“It’s more shocking to actually see the numbers,” he said. “You know it happens, but to know how much it happens (is a lot different).”

One of the program’s biggest goals is sexual assault prevention and preventing women from being easy targets, which mathematics junior Mattea Juengel said is the most important aspect.

“There definitely have been situations where I wish I would’ve known (self-defense). I’ve never had to use anything physical, but have used prevention tactics,” said Juengel, who is training to be a facilitator. “It’s cool because I can see myself using those now when I go out with my friends.”

Another aim is to clear up misconceptions, such as the myth that not walking alone at night will keep a person from getting assaulted, Nelson said.

“We want (to hire) student facilitators who know that there’s a lot more to it than not walking alone at night,” she said.

Ray said it’s important for students to protect themselves, because it’s unrealistic to never have to walk alone at night.

All of the facilitators also stress the simplicity of self-defense.

“Self-defense moves can be used by anyone in any situation,” said Tami Davis, who has been a facilitator for almost three years.

The elementary education junior said there have been times when she’s needed to use her self-defense skills.

“It wasn’t like a rape situation, but definitely one where I could have been potentially hurt,” she said.

As a resident mentor in Wonders Hall, Davis also has used her skills to break up dorm fights.

Overall, the goal is to promote safety and awareness for students, whether it’s by getting involved with the Self Defense for Women program, or taking the semester-long class.

“I just think it’s really important to not have to be at the mercy of someone who’s attacking you,” Chalifoux said. “You shouldn’t just have to lay there and let them do it. Learning how to block a punch can save your life.”