Over the past ten years, January has been recognized as National Stalking Awareness month across the country and, through promoting awareness about the issue, SMSU’s New Horizons Crisis Center is joining in to help students be more aware of this ever-growing issue.

Posters lined along the walls of SMSU show the statistics and various kinds of stalking. With these, Holly Johnson, program director/relationship series presenter for NHCC, hopes to get the word out about NHCC’s services and help people realize that stalking is a serious issue.

“One of the reasons why I feel that stalking is an important issue to be addressed is because with technology advances, the ways people are stalked has grown. People still will physically follow other people but a lot more of it is now through Social media sites, internet and phones,” Johnson said.

According to Johnson, NHCC has both Twitter and Facebook which they’ve used to update the community of current happenings.

According to the National Center for Victims of Crime, 6.6 million people are stalked in one year in the U.S.

With that number increasing, helping students become more aware of this issue will not only inform them of what this issue is, but will help them recognize in situations they normally wouldn’t.

Though no events are being held in Jan. for National Stalking Awareness Month, NHCC will continue to promote stalking victims as well as others during the week of Apr. 6-12, known as National Crime Victim’s Rights Week.

For more information about this issue or if you would like to contact NHCC, their numbers are:
Campus Office: 507-537-6817
24-Hour Crisis Line: 507-532-5764
NHCC is located in SS 227.