Onlookers pelted 300 Take Back the Night supporters with rotten fruit as they passed fraternity houses, residence halls and student apartments at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s march against sexual violence last year.

Northwestern supporters expect a different reaction at the 13th annual TBTN march tonight at 8 p.m. at The Rock.

Unlike UI’s all-female march, NU’s march drew 800 students last year, both men and women. At NU’s event, banners hung in the Fraternity Quads, and participants attended a pre-march barbecue in the Sorority Quads.

Women’s Coalition members expect about 1,000 participants, estimating that 30 percent of them will be men. Students from University of Chicago and other area schools will be bused in to attend the march.

“This is not a fight women can win alone — it is something everyone must fight,” said Karyn Bass, former director of NU’s Women’s Co. “Ten years ago when there was an idea of separatism and the men walked behind the women, then there was animosity.”

UI permits men to participate in the pre-march vigil, but Pat Moray, UI’s program director for the Office of Women’s Programs, said male onlookers react negatively because they feel threatened by their exclusion from the march.

“I’m not sure why some folks feel threatened by this march,” Moray said. “It may be an issue of men not wanting women to be allowed to do something on their own — it’s a power issue.”

Becket Bessolo, program coordinator of NU’s Women’s Center, said NU’s TBTN program had similar difficulties when it started in 1988. Bessolo said programs organized by Women’s Co have helped the entire campus embrace TBTN.

“Sexual assault education on campus is bringing greater awareness and sensitivity of the subject,” Bessolo said. “Peers are educating peers, people are talking straight up about things here.”

At the University of Arizona, 75 of 40,000 undergraduates participated in the coed TBTN march last October.

Rebecca Knox, co-director of the UA Women’s Research Center, said students at UA are apathetic.

“To us it seems obvious that it’s important, but students are uninformed and don’t understand the importance of this kind of issue and that it could affect them,” Knox said.

Bass says NU’s TBTN has a powerful impact on campus because it raises student awareness of sexual assault.

“It does happen here — it happens in dorm rooms and frat parties, not just in dark allies,” said Bass, a Weinberg senior. “We have a very inclusive nature about Take Back the Night.”