The Youth Dating Violence Prevention Project

A manual was created for The Youth Dating Violence Prevention Project, and is available for $25.00 from Flamborough Information and Community Services. You can contact Flamborough Information and Community Services (FICS) at fics@infoflam.on.ca or by their mailing address: Box 240, Waterdown, ON. L0R 2H0.

Acknowledgements
This manual would not have been possible without the generous funding of the Ontario Women's Directorate, as well as, the hard work, enthusiasm and commitment of the steering committee. The two project directors were the spark that initiated the program and fanned its flames while the co-ordinator made it all happen on a day to day basis. A special thanks to our steering committee members. Thank-you to the schools, Waterdown District High, Flamborough Centre and Balaclava, who brought the program to life and finally to the students who cared enough to learn about dating violence themselves and then were brave enough to pass their knowledge on to others.

Introduction
This manual describes the Youth Dating Violence Prevention Project that was undertaken by Flamborough Information and Community Services and Good Shepherd Martha House in the spring of 1999. The project, intended to address concerns with dating violence, was developed with the help of a community steering committee. The project included:

A Teen Summit - The Teen Summit on Dating Violence provided an opportunity to bring high school students together to learn about and discuss dating violence. The objective of the summit was to provide information about healthy and unhealthy relationships to any teen wanting to attend. The Summit provided an opportunity to encourage students to volunteer to be peer educators. The Summit was advertised through posters, flyers and announcements at the high school. In addition, guidance counsellors identified and approached particular students who they felt might benefit from the summit or make excellent educators. The summit was open to students from grades 9 - O.A.C.. It was hoped that this would provide a variety of perspectives and give the project longevity since some students would remain in the high school for several years.

The summit was held over two days. The topic of dating violence rarely receives the educational time it requires. The committee felt strongly that two days would allow for a more thorough coverage of this important subject and offer students time to digest the information they were receiving so that they could return the second day with questions. The summit included presentations as well as workshops. Students also received a folder including resources and dating violence information. The first day of the summit was dedicated to informing students about the issues and the second day focused on solutions to the problems that had been discussed during day 1. Thus students were not left feeling depressed and helpless but rather were encouraged to become active in their own relationships, in the peer educator program and in the wider community. At the end of the summit it was hoped that each student would leave a 'mini-expert' in the area of dating violence. Even if they decided not to be a peer presenter, they could now act as a source of accurate information for their peers.

Training - Twenty-three high school students were trained as peer educators. The students were involved in creating the presentations they would make to middle school students. Although students had attended the teen summit and therefore now had a good background in dating violence, a 12-week training programme was instituted for three reasons. The first was to ensure that the students would be ready to deal with the questions that the middle school students would come up with. Second, it was important to involve the students in developing the tools that they would use in their presentations. Finally, all the presenters needed to be using the tools in the same way; they needed to train themselves in their use. The groups were run twice a week during lunch hours.
The complete breakdown of the 12 weeks of training is available in the Manual.

Peer Presentations - The high school students made presentations to 7 classes of grade 8 students. Pre and post-test evaluations indicated that both the teen summit and the peer presentations were effective in educating students about healthy and unhealthy relationships. Groups of four to five high school students with an adult facilitator went to grade eight classes to provide a 1 to 1 1/2 hour presentation on dating violence.

The peer education presentation began with an introduction to the program and the peer educators. The first task was filling out the pre-test. The post-test was given to the teacher to be filled out the next day. (see appendix) This provided information for the evaluation of the project but also started students thinking about the issue.

A manual. The manual includes a section on how this program might be implemented in the future as well as detailed instructions for all the educational tools that were used in the peer presentations. The manual is available for a fee of $25 from Flamborough Information & Community Services.

This has been a partnership program between:
Ontario Women's Directorate
Good Shepherd/Martha House
Flamborough Information and Community Services.