Defensive Women: Juniors Ashley Martin and Adeline Clifford are starting a women’s self-defense club for students in the Shawnee Mission area to teach them how to defend themselves in dangerous situations

The Women’s Self-Defense Club, started by juniors Ashley Martin and Adeline Clifford, will have their first meeting on Nov. 16 at Gracie Barra, a jiu-jitsu and self-defense training facility in Overland Park.

Members of the club will be taught defensive techniques applicable to real-life situations like sexual assault. According to Martin, teaching these skills to women who will be starting college is especially important. 

“There’s a lot of dangerous situations that you could find yourself in, and even if you just know the basics, it’s always good to just have the confidence to get yourself out of those situations,” Martin said.

Martin and Clifford are the co-presidents of the club and junior Kirsten Meredith is the treasurer who will handle any financial needs of the club that may come up like buying club shirts. Meredith also helps manage social media and designed the logo for the club.

Initially, gifted facilitator Mary Holsworth — Martin’s school counselor — helped her start the club, but since they have members from other schools, the club isn’t officially registered with East.

The classes will be taught by Silvana Flores who owns Gracie Barra with her husband — both black belts in jiu-jitsu. The students plan to meet once or twice a month.

Some of Martin’s family members took classes at Gracie Barra, which led her to attend classes coached by Flores. A couple of weeks later, Flores became Martin’s boss when Martin began working at the front desk there as a part-time job. Martin also started coaching kids’ jiu-jitsu classes as she progressed from a white belt to a blue belt.

Jiu-jitsu is a sport commonly practiced with a uniform and belt. However, for the club meetings, students only need to wear athletic clothes like leggings because their classes are more geared toward use in practical situations to defend themselves from real attackers.

Some basic techniques in self-defense the students will learn include kicking someone away when being attacked, having a stable fighting stance and knowing how to escape someone’s grip.

Flores agreed to teach the women’s self-defense classes for free as she frequently hosts women’s self-defense seminars at Gracie Barra that are also free of charge. 

“[Flores] loves doing [self-defense] seminars, especially for high schoolers, so she was totally open to the idea,” Martin said. “She’ll plan out the lessons and we’ll just show up and be ready to learn.”

Beginning with a Snapchat group chat consisting mostly of Martin’s close friends, their club soon grew to nearly 40 girls as members added their friends from East and different schools. 

Junior Jordan O’Brien found out about the club when Martin texted her about joining the group chat. O’Brien immediately agreed to join because she thought it would be fun and useful.

“There’s terrible people out there, you know?” O’Brien said. “[They] think that women can’t defend themselves, so I’m just hoping that we can better protect ourselves if we’re ever in a situation like that.”