A group of students at the University of Colorado Boulder is working to increase awareness and engagement with their annual Take Back the Night event Wednesday evening, a student-run event that’s part of a global movement to end all types of sexual violence.

The event is set for 6 to 9 p.m. Wednesday at the University Memorial Center south terrace tent, 1669 Euclid Ave. It will include speakers, a march around Farrand Field, a candlelight vigil and representatives from various local groups and campus clubs.

“We have a campus culture that doesn’t acknowledge sexual violence and is heavily focused on Greek life, and so we want to talk about those things, bring people awareness to off-campus resources, because marginalized folks don’t always feel safe accessing those on-campus resources,” junior Aspen Rawson said.

Rawson hopes the event will encourage students to meet one another.

“People are more likely to stand up for people that they know,” Rawson said. “An event like Take Back the Night brings the community together and allows us to meet each other, find out about resources, and those things can save lives.”

Rawson said the event typically happens every year, but it doesn’t get much attention or support. This year, the goal is to have more than 100 attendees, compared with the 60 to 80 people who have attended in the past.

“We think it deserves more attention, and there should be more done to protect students from this kind of thing,” freshman Fiona Wallace said.

Wallace cited CU Boulder’s 2024 Sexual Assault and Related Harms Survey, released earlier this month, which shows a substantial increase in harassment reports and shows that about 18% of undergraduate women have been sexually assaulted since coming to CU Boulder.

Wallace said that 18% is almost one in five, which is an alarming number.

“That is a pretty big problem,” Wallace said.

Rawson was first introduced to Take Back the Night as a student at Front Range Community College, which holds a well-publicized Take Back the Night event annually on its Longmont campus. Rawson was inspired to build up and help expand CU Boulder’s event after that.

“We’re just really hoping to build something great,” Rawson said.

Part of the problem, Rawson said, is that CU Boulder student organizing is “really lackluster” due to the compartmentalization of different students and student groups, which makes it hard to organize. Event attendance has also lagged since the pandemic, but is improving.

The event is student-funded. Some student organizations wanted to contribute funds but couldn’t based on the university’s student organization rules, Rawson said. The Center for Student Involvement offered to contribute funds last minute, Rawson said, which the students declined since they had already raised the money among themselves.

Rawson said it would be ideal if student organizations had more freedom to fund what they want, and believes that Take Back the Night should be a grassroots movement led by students.

“What I don’t want is for the university to see this event and see how powerful it is and then institutionalize it and make it an event that CU puts on themselves in a way that … prevents students from actually effectively organizing and tangibly making changes on campus,” Rawson said.

Rawson said getting people together and raising awareness through Take Back the Night is critically important. The event is open to students, staff, faculty and alumni.

“The more we know each other, the safer we are,” Rawson said.