Charlie Haw has been a university police officer for 20 years, but his effect has perhaps been felt no stronger than during his four years as a rape defense instructor.Haw has taught classes in the University Police Department’s Rape Aggression Defense program since it began. He said one young woman who had taken the class escaped from a man who was trying to kill her by strangulation.”The attack lasted 45 minutes, but the assailant gave up,” he said.Haw said the program’s focus is on sexual assault prevention and awareness. Students are taught to walk with an aggressive stance, make eye contact and be aware of their surroundings.”Awareness takes away opportunities for aggression and assault,” Haw said.Awareness skills can be used to prevent crimes such as theft and violent assault, as well as sexual assault, he said.Although the class focuses on sexual assault prevention, it also addresses the physical aspect of women’s self-defense. Haw teaches basic fighting techniques that can be used to fend off an assailant.”A lot of women have never hit anyone before,” Haw said. “We teach a few simple but basic techniques.”Haw said the class is effective in teaching women to avoid sexual assault situations and to escape when the situations do occur.More than one in eight college women are raped, according to the Rape Prevention Program and Ohio Department of Health. But women who use physical self-defense strategies in addition to trying to escape from or call attention to the situation have an 86 percent chance of escaping from a sexual assault situation. This is compared to a 63 percent chance of escape when using only such strategies as yelling or running away.In Ohio in 1995, there were 868 arrests made on charges of forcible rape, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. This figure does not include unreported rapes or rapes in which the attacker was not arrested. Deborah Schipper, acting coordinator of the OSU Rape Education and Prevention Program, said the FBI has named rape as the most underreported crime in the nation, with as few as one in ten rapes being reported.The self-defense class is offered in room 136 of Larkins Hall every Friday and Sunday from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. A one-time $30 fee is required.