Fight like a girl
Girl Scout earns Silver Award organizing rape escape program
BY JENNIFER KOHLHEPP
Staff Writer

PHOTOSBYSCOTTFRIEDMAN Stephanie Dreifus, 15, (top photo) and Becky Weir, 14, both of Millstone, practice a technique for breaking free from a choke hold while Amber McGarvey, 13, (left photo) and Erinn Benedict, 14, both of Millstone, practice a method for blocking punches during "Fight Like a Girl" at Wagner Farm Park in Millstone on May 20.

MILLSTONE - Sexual assault can happen anywhere, and many young girls simply don't have the basic skills it takes to overcome an aggressor.

Millstone Township Girl Scout Stephanie Dreifus, 15, helped empower local young women on May 20 by organizing a self-defense program called "Fight Like a Girl." The program educated and trained 20 girls in assault and rape prevention, self-defense and personal protection.

Dreifus hosted Donna McCaron, a certified rape escape instructor with a black belt in tae kwon do from Cranbury, to teach the class at Wagner Farm Park.

McCaron is involved in the Plainsboro Township Domestic Violence Response Team and Mercer County's Eastern Regional Domestic Violence Response and Sexual Assault Response teams. She has trained in the martial arts since 1993 but recently discovered she never felt comfortable with her ability to defend herself against a violent sexual assault.

Determined to teach herself - and the response teams she works with - self-defense against a sexual attack, McCaron did lots of research online and discovered rapeescape.

com, which offered an instructor certification course in three weeks in Westchester County, N.Y. She discovered the Rape Escape techniques to be simple, effective and easy to remember.

McCaron now teaches Rape Escape throughout the state in karate schools and in specially organized programs like Dreifus'. Dreifus hosted Rape Escape Level 1 and wants to schedule additional classes for local young women in the near future.

During the "Fight Like a Girl" program, McCaron taught local teenagers solutions to some of the most common sexual assault scenarios.

Dreifus said that if girls learn how to protect themselves and to escape dangerous situations, they can more easily report wrongdoing.

"If we can report the men doing these things, then we can teach them a lesson to never try it again," Dreifus said.

Organizing "Fight Like a Girl" partly earned Dreifus the Girl Scout's Cadet Silver Award. As part of her project she also collected women's products such as sports bras, underwear, sanitary products, and hair brushes to donate to Womanspace in Mercer County, which provides support to victims of domestic violence and sexual assault.

For Dreifus, who is a freshman at Allentown High School and a marching band member who plays the flute, organizing the program was not nearly as difficult as trying to get local girls interested in attending.

"Girls at the high school thought it was dumb," Dreifus said. "But those who attended really got a lot out of it. We had so much fun and we really learned a lot about defending ourselves, which is important, especially seeing on the news about girls being attacked and kidnapped."

Initially, "Fight Like a Girl" was a Millstone Township Troop 911 endeavor, but it became Dreifus' solo project after her troop disbanded a few months ago.

"The troop fell apart and the other girls got involved in different activities," Dreifus said.

Undaunted by having to go it alone, Dreifus not only finished what she started with "Fight Like a Girl" but also hopes to organize a new local Girl Scout troop this fall and wants to hold Rape Escape Level 2 sometime later this year.

In the follow-up "Fight Like a Girl," McCaron will return to address some of the date rape or acquaintance rape scenario solutions. Women will learn easy and effective techniques that can give them the control they need in dangerous situations.

Hoping to set an example for young women with busy schedules everywhere, Dreifus will go on to try to earn a Girl Scout Gold Award, which will require much more schedule juggling, dedication and community service than earning her Silver Award did.

"It takes work to lead, and if stuff goes wrong, you have to learn to work around the problems and the obstacles and the people who make things hard for you," Dreifus said. "It is a lot of work, but it is fun and rewarding to see how much others get out of what you do."

Dreifus commended the women in her life for setting such good examples.

"My mother, my grandmothers, my aunts and my teachers are very strong and very confident, and I want to be that strong and confident when I get older too," she said.

Dreifus said she had a strong support system in making "Fight Like a Girl" a reality, and she thanked her mother, Laura, her father, Len, and her former troop leader, Rose Barbaree, for all of their help.