Dating violence is more common than you may think, especially among teens and young adults. 1 in 3 U.S. teens will experience physical, sexual, or emotional abuse from someone they’re in a relationship with before becoming adults.
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The YWCA Northcentral PA’s Prevention & Awareness Education team provides violence prevention and awareness education, trainings, and workshops throughout our community. Offered to children and teens, college students, community and service groups, local youth groups, the medical industry, and other professional groups, sessions are customized to meet the specific audience’s needs.
Learn more about all our professional education team has to offer below.
Becoming trauma-informed
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
Trauma-informed care is a strength-based framework that offers an understanding and responsiveness to the impact of trauma. This training will emphasize physical, psychological, and emotional safety for both providers and survivors, creating an opportunity for survivors to rebuild a sense of control and empowerment.
Bullying Prevention
No school is immune to bullying and threats of violence. This training shares information for students to help identify bullying and ways to put a stop to it, with information tailored specifically based on grade level.
Bystander intervention for students
Students are often witnessing things they may not even realize. Our Bystander Intervention training targets students to offer them ways to be proactive bystanders, and to distinguish the difference between playful teasing and hurtful actions. Students will exit this training feeling well-versed in learning how to notice the event, interpret its potential danger, assume responsibility, know to help and step up.
diversity, inclusion, and bias
Research has shown that diverse and inclusive environments in the workplace empower individuals to come together, boosting overall morale. Creating this culture is more than just eliminating intentional acts of harassment and discrimination. This training will help uncover unconscious bias and implicit biases that can impact one’s decisions and interactions in professional settings.
domestic violence 101
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
Our trained professionals offer DV 101 to audiences of all kinds. Each training provides an overview of the dynamics and prevalence of domestic violence. This training will teach participants effective advocacy skills that support safety and empowerment across many facets. Covered topics include types of abuse, cycles of abuse, identifying abusers and victims, effects on children, protection from abuse orders, and more.
emotional intelligence
Emotional Intelligence training is a set of practical knowledge and skills that help individuals become fluent in understanding the language of emotions. Knowing that individuals can be set back when faced with triggering circumstances, rapid change, and disruption or high-stress environments, this training will focus on developing an understanding of self-awareness, self-regulation, self-motivation, empathy, and social skills. Audiences can be of a variety of age ranges or professional backgrounds.
girl empowerment
Information from this workshop will equip girls with tools and information to make positive choices and educated decisions through their most impressionable years. Girls will engage in activities that improve their self-confidence while ultimately instilling the skills and mindsets needed to go out and positively impact the world.
healthy relationships for adults
Individuals in this training will be given the opportunity to reflect on their own relationships while using those experiences as tools to guide their understanding. The course will cover many topics, including how to improve unhealthy relationships, warning signs to watch for, the creation of boundaries, effects on children, and how to help someone in an unhealthy relationship.
healthy relationship project (Care for kids, we care elementary, safe-t)
The Healthy Relationship Project training is broken into three targeted training, all focusing on Healthy Relationship topics, prepared in age-appropriate manners. Each training is geared towards both youth AND educators and caregivers. Topics from any noted training can include communication skills, nurturing skills, understanding boundaries, feelings, etc. Care for Kids provides a curriculum suitable for children 3-8 years old. We Care Elementary provides a curriculum suitable for students in grades 3-6 with a heavy focus on being comfortable discussing topics at hand. SAFE-T provides a curriculum suitable for students in grades 7-8 with a heavy focus on skill-building related to healthy relationships.
human trafficking
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
Human trafficking is a hidden crime, and the first step to combating it is to identify victims so they can be rescued and help bring perpetrators to justice. This training will provide education on what trafficking is, who can be targeted, how to identify it, and how to respond if you witness it happening around you.
parenting for prevention
Parenting for prevention opens parents up to see their role in the primary prevention of sexual abuse of their children. The multi-week course will provide parents with skills to talk to their children (and teenagers) about healthy relationships, consent, respect, becoming a trusted adult, warning signals in an abuser, and much more. Parents will complete this course feeling confident in their ability to have an open and honest conversation regarding teen dating violence and sexual assault with their children or teens.
preventing sexual harassment in the workplace
Sexual harassment training provides employers, supervisors, and employees a means to understand what sexual harassment is, applicable laws that define it, and compliance requirements to avoid it. The topics will also cover inappropriate and appropriate forms of behavior in the workplace, understanding one’s role as a bystander and how to react should an act of harassment be witnessed and best practices to intervene when a risk of sexual violence may occur.
relationships decoded
Broken into Introductory and Advanced training, decoding relationships are designed to help individuals with developmental challenges recognize signs of abuse and coercion, use their assertiveness appropriately, and how to report abuse. Tips are shared to ensure participants feel secure in understanding consent and recognizing social-sexual laws and norms.
Sexting
The Sexting presentation will explore exactly what ‘sexting’ is, identify the risks along with the potential consequences, understand peer pressure, and will also identify strategies for avoiding sexting while enhancing positive relationships.
sexual assault 101
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
Sexual Assault is defined as any unwanted, forced, or coerced sexual contact without the consent or against another person’s will. Our trained professionals offer Sexual Assault 101 to audiences of all ages – as sexual assault can happen to anyone, anywhere. Each training provides participants with effective advocacy skills that support safety and empowerment across many facets. Covered topics include types of assault, dangers of sexting, human trafficking, and various ways to respond and react when faced with sexual assault.
Sexual & Reproductive coercion
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
A common type of abuse in many relationships is sexual and reproductive coercion. Sexual and reproductive coercion is when an abuser makes their partner feel that they have no choice but to submit to sexual activity and possibly pregnancy. They may feel this way due to physical violence and threats as well as emotional and verbal abuse. This four-part workshop goes in-depth explaining the complex connections between reproductive health, domestic violence, and survivor safety. All participants are trained in assessing patients for intimate partner violence.
Strangulation, Traumatic brain injury & Domestic Violence
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
Studies show that most domestic violence victims suffer from blunt force to the head, neck, and face area. Injuries to the head and neck are among the major causes of traumatic brain injury (TBI). A victim of DV may sustain a TBI without their knowledge. Many individuals may receive no medical care or intervention, thus dramatically increasing the likelihood of recurrent TBI(s), which may result in more severe neurological damage. Our professionals offer up-to-date information on how TBI and strangulation affect the brain, how brain injury compounds with trauma, and how to refer patients with domestic violence-related TBI to victim services.
teen dating violence
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
Educating our teens about healthy relationships is critical to preventing dating abuse. Our comprehensive, best-practices model includes tips on how to implement a school-wide dating violence policy to provide students with the tools and strength to be leaders in preventing dating violence among their classmates.
understanding the lgbtqia+ COmmunity
*This series can be tailored specifically for medical professionals*
This training offers a series of workshops discussing sex and gender, gender expression, names and pronouns, microaggressions, bystander awareness, how to be an ally, and much more. There are presentation styles to vary based on audience and professional setting.