The sun was setting against the 6 p.m. sky and a small purple tent where participants received purple glow sticks sat on the Syracuse University quad surrounded by purple balloons.

One mile later, the same purple tent sprung up again. This was Go Purple: Run, Walk, or Roll, a run, walk, or whatever focusing on domestic violence awareness.

October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and the walk kicked off the It’s On Us Week of action. Senior Samantha Skaller is a peer educator for Syracuse’s Office of Health Promotion, the organization that puts on the event. She said the run’s purpose was more than its connection to It’s On Us.

“The walk is to spread awareness for the month, and the point is to have a consistent message,” she said. “Although It’s On Us has a National Week Of Action of condensed activism in one week, we are trying to make the message far and wide, and as consistent throughout the semester and next semester and really the year, as we can.”

Participants walked to different locations spread across campus where numerous stations sporting a different game or activity were waiting.

Connie Flores, a worker for the Office of Health Promotion, helped man the first station. On her table were multiple “cootie catchers,” which were referred to as “love catchers,” which for Flores proved an effective way to bring up difficult topics.

When a participant opened the final flap of the love catcher, they had to answer a question pertaining to relationships and how they can become potentially harmful.

“I think this is a really cute way of bringing up topics that people don’t normally talk about,” Flores said. “These are all little tiny things that are a part of a relationship that no one really pays attention to, so it is kind of good to see people figure out where they stand on certain topics.”

This “cute” game held significance to Flores, as she said she felt it brought up discussion about these sensitive topics without offending anyone.

Games like Jenga, run by Victoria Navarro and Vivianna Salce, both peer educators, educated people about why someone might stay in an abusive relationship.

The Jenga tower itself symbolized “the instability of an abusive relationship and how it could come tumbling down at any moment,” said Salce. Playing the Jenga game represents how also when you remove a Jenga block, you are taking pieces of the person in an abusive relationship.

There were also board games like Chutes and Ladders, and a table, held by peer educator Marina Cortes. Its game was simply to spin a wheel and find a solution to a scenario corresponding to the number spun.

“There’s a lot of options that people can choose. People like to get physical, some people don’t. Some people get authority figures, some people don’t. It is really just what you would do, and being comfortable with intervening,” she said.

The run as a whole was about raising awareness and discussion on domestic violence, something that was not lost on the participants, including Chip Weber and Lena Blum.

“It is good to spread the word about domestic violence, because it is a problem, and the only way to solve it is by talking about it,” Weber said.

Published on October 10, 2016 at 12:28 am