The UW-Madison student group Sex Out Loud wants students to know good sex feels great.

This theme was carried over into a Sexual Awareness Festival cosponsored by Sex Out Loud and University Health Services April 19 at Library Mall.

Throughout the school year, Sex Out Loud sponsors interactive programs for dorms, student organizations and classrooms to raise sexual awareness among students.

The festival marks the end of Sexual Health week and the end of the year for Sex Out Loud.

The festival included a contraceptive corner that showed how to use various contraceptives, a condom dart throw, an erotic food stand, a condom art table where participants were able to decorate condoms, an STD table that documented different STDs and their symptoms and an HIV/AIDS awareness stand.

Paula Cody, UW senior and event coordinator for Sex Out Loud, said the event emphasized safer sex and healthy decision-making.

Information was available to students regarding topics ranging from STDs to sexual pleasure.

“Almost every area of sexual health was represented,” Cody said.

The festival was intended to be informational, but there were also interactive games for those who attended.

“It is important to make it fun so that people aren’t intimidated,” Cody explained.

She said games were used as a means to present sex and surrounding issues positively.

Jonathan Zarov, communications manager of UHS, said it is important to present sex positively.

“Too often sex is only represented as negative, and it is important to get people talking about these issues and not feel so frightened,” Zarov said.

Zarov said the festival publicized health problems.

“A lot of health problems occur because people feel isolated, and bringing issues into the community help people open up,” he said.

Zarov said students should attend events such as the Sexual Awareness Festival and expose themselves to such issues in order to further their own sexual education.

“Everyone has something to learn,” he said.

UW sophomore Kelly Armstrong attended the festival and said it was educational and entertaining.

“It is fun to see things such as sex out in the open and exposed,” she said.

Armstrong said that the issues presented affect everyone, and the information provided answered many taboo issues she had wondered about.

“Events such as these help people not to feel embarrassed about sexual issues,” she said.

UW freshman Sam Fuhrmann agreed the event helped to make people more aware.

“You could learn about all kinds of things, from STDs to how to please yourself,” he said.

Although he found the event to be eye-opening, Fuhrmann said he found some of the presentations shocking.

“Some things were a little over the top, but the presentation definitely attracts people,” Fuhrmann said.