Prevention and Education

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The key to prevention is education and for that reason we bring our prevention programming into schools and communities throughout our five county region.  Studies have shown that making an investment in our youth and the future of our communities, we can help cut down the number of abuse cases significantly. This is largely done by strategic partnerships, shared vision and education for the purpose of influencing behavior and creating social change. We believe the greatest chance we have at curbing and eliminating violence is by promoting respect and tolerance and addressing the current level of acceptance of violence.

Active Bystander Intervention discourages victim blaming by switching the focus of prevention to what a community of people/students can do collectively. This approach encourages people to identify situations that might lead to a sexual assault, a domestic assault or someone being bullied and then how to safely intervene to prevent the act from occurring.  The approach also allows for a change in cultural expectations by empowering everyone to say or do something when they see inappropriate or harmful behavior.  This method of intervention places the responsibility of prevention on everyone!

Safety is paramount in active bystander intervention. Usually, intervening in a group is safer than intervening individually. Also, choosing a method of intervention that deescalates the situation is safer than attempting a confrontation.  Some methods are direct, and some of them are less obvious to the perpetrator: 

• Making up an excuse to get him/her out of a potentially dangerous situation 
• Letting a friend or co-worker know that his or her actions may lead to serious consequences 
• Never leaving a his/her side, despite the efforts of someone to get him/her alone or away from you 
• Using a group of friends to remind someone behaving inappropriately that his or her behavior should be respectful 
• Taking steps to curb someone’s use of alcohol before problems occur 
• Calling the authorities when the situation warrants

Collaboration projects include: ·    

• Collaboration with Probation and County Court that is a program for teens at risk. ·    
• Collaboration with the District Court Judge and Drug Court to offer a group for female participants on healthy relationships and boundaries.