Niagara College will be honouring missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls this Friday.

On May 5, the college will be lowering its flags to half-mast and hanging red dresses at its campuses in Welland and Niagara-on-the-Lake. 

Red Dress Day is observed country-wide on this date every year to recognize the legacy of violence against Indigenous women, girls, and members of the LGBTQ community across Canada.

According to a Statistics Canada report Indigenous women and girls are consistently murdered at a rate four times that of their non-Indigenous peers.

“The red dresses offer a striking reminder of this national human rights issue, and we honour and remember the lives of our stolen sisters on this important day,” said Leah Hogan, Niagara College’s associate director of Indigenous education, in a press release. 

The college asks people to wear red in recognition of the unique violence faced by Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people.

It is also inviting people on a commemorative walk through downtown St. Catharines from St. Catharines City Hall at 5:30 p.m. to the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine & Performing Arts.