On Feb. 6, the Indiana Wesleyan University (IWU) Student Government Association (SGA) hosted, Awareness Night, an event raising awareness surrounding Human Trafficking at the Globe Theater.

The purpose of the event was to inform IWU students, faculty and the Marion community about global human trafficking.

The event included speakers who worked with individuals in human trafficking around the world, including Marion. The speakers at the event included Jason Tash, Sia M’bayo and Janet Bailey.

During the Q&A portion of the night, each speaker described their roles in Marion or around the world. Tash discussed his role in Destiny Rescue. Tash traveled the world rescuing girls from strip clubs. M’bayo works for a strip club ministry in Marion. Bailey is the Executive Director of First Light Child Advocacy Center in Marion.

Kira Raquet, vice president of SGA Student Activities, led the evening with help from both student representatives and her classmates. The classmates that assisted her included Jaden Harrison, Rylee Smith, Brady West, Lauren Stahley and Haley Perry.

Raquet said that she and her classmates started planning this event during the month of November. The reason Raquet and her classmates planned the even was the impact their Issues of Human Trafficking class had on them last semester at IWU. The group was instructed to complete a project about human trafficking as part of their course requirements. Raquet wanted to provide an event for Indiana Wesleyan University instead of a paper. 

The event started with the showing of “Nefarious,” a documentary about individuals who had been affected by human trafficking. The documentary discussed statistics about how many people are trafficked in the world annually.

Katelyn Ayers, an IWU student, said, “’Nefarious’ was (an) eye-opening documentary and got to learn lots about what human sex trafficking looks like both international and in the states.”

The Abbey Coffee Co. provided coffee and Fairtrade snacks for the event. Raquet said, “Fairtrade is a product made without using unfair human labor sometimes slave labor, but when it is Fairtrade, they know the farmer or producer and can track that product exactly where it came from.”

During the Q&A portion of the event, a student to asked about how students can take action with human trafficking around the world and in the community.

Brianna Westover, a senior SGA Representative, said “I think a lot of people do not know how real human trafficking is and that is it local and is happening here in America. I hope it stirs people’s hearts to taking action as much as they can for people who do not have a voice.”