In today’s society, dangerous crime rates can cause people to feel the need to take matters into their own hands and learn how to defend themselves. Some warriors have taken this as an opportunity to gain experience in defending themselves by taking self defense classes.

Sophomore Mary Scott Wilder decided to learn self defense for her MYP project, and took her friend Madison Green along for the experience. “The class helped me accomplish my goal by giving me thorough experience in self defense and how and when to effectively use it,” she said.

In this class, the students learned different maneuvers on how to escape an attacker’s grasp, where attacker’s weak points are, and the proper stances to defend yourself in multiple dangerous situations. The class was taught five maneuvers to perform on the face and head area of the attacker and ten moves to physically fight off an attacker. They also learned strategies to avoid attackers, such as not being on your phone and always being aware of your surroundings while walking because attackers look for people who aren’t paying attention.

“My favorite part of the class was getting to hitting a wooden plank into halves.” said sophomore Molly Harrigan.  “I felt so strong and empowered afterwards.”

Each student in the class was expected to strike a wooden board into halves in order to show their strength and boost their confidence.

The instructor emphasized the importance of mastering the skills and did not move on until every student was confident with the maneuver. “I know now that you do not have to be really strong to effectively defend yourself, it’s more strategic,” said Green.

Each student said that they walked away with valuable knowledge and felt that they could use what they learned to protect themselves in the real world. “It is important for everyone to take a self defense class because it will improve the world of women in being confident and self assured.” said Scott.

Based on what these Warriors learned, self defense is definitely something that students should consider.