A young woman’s journey to healing from sexual or domestic violence is as painful as it is lifelong. VI’s Positively Prevented program seeks to eradicate this violence at its source through positive and empowering education and resources for children and adolescents of both genders.

For children from elementary school through college, VI’s Positively Prevented program will increase understanding about healthy male/female relationships, appropriate conflict resolution, and self-esteem enrichment to reduce the likelihood that young people will find themselves to be victims or perpetrators of unhealthy partnerships or violent episodes from ages 16-24 and beyond.

This includes education (resources and interactive sessions) around what negative behaviors to avoid; awareness and safety skills; precursors to violent behavior and reducing vulnerability to them; and ways in which young people can feel better about themselves in general and stronger in who they are as empowered individuals who neither should accept nor resort to violence.

We also seek to educate the parents of children and adolescents about how to model healthy behavior for their sons and daughters; how to boost their kids’ self-esteem; how to talk to children openly in age-appropriate ways about positive and negative relationship characteristics; how to identify behaviors or other signals that their children may be vulnerable to violence; and where to get help should the unthinkable occur.

Ultimately, the program will also serve as a vehicle for stronger parent-child connections and relationships from an early age through the child’s college years, which numerous studies prove reduces victim/abuser tendencies in adulthood.