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As a certified prevention program, New Directions implements relevant programming that educates our community about domestic, intimate partner, and sexual violence. New Directions hopes to shape Knox County into a place where community members do not tolerate violence and instead promote healthy, loving relationships. New Directions understands that no one has to do everything, but everyone has to do something to create a violence-free community.
New Directions school prevention programming is available to all Knox County Local Schools at all grade levels. New Directions prevention programming encourages youth to foster healthy relationships with themselves, their peers, and their families to reduce problematic behavior such as violence, and bullying, while improving the perception of safety, social-emotional competence, and increasing positive school climate and culture.
The Curriculum Adaptation Statewide Workgroup was formed in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to maximize prevention efforts across the State of Ohio. The goal of this workgroup was to create a product that would allow prevention curriculum to be adapted to fit the needs of virtual learning environments of all kinds.
By creating the “Prevention Best Practices Portal”, we were able to combine the efforts of sexual assault and domestic violence prevention workers across Ohio to provide preventionists with different resources related to building connections, pre-work, email templates, scripts, setting the classroom environment, and virtual learning tools. If you are here, we hope you find this portal useful for the work you do!
The Teen Advisory Council of Knox is a youth-led prevention team funded out of DELTA IMPACT of New Directions and Knox Substance Abuse Action Team. TAC members are passionate, informed high school students who focus on preventing unhealthy behaviors among Knox County youth before they begin while serving as ambassadors of healthy lifestyles in their schools and communities. TAC engages Knox community youth in initiatives to prevent intimate partner violence, underage substance use and abuse, and suicide. TAC encourages young men and women to stand up for themselves while making wholesome choices and maintaining healthy relationships among their peers. TAC empowers members with confidence to use their voice for positive change, to hone their leadership skills, and to plan and coordinate events.
Healthy Relationships prevention programming is available to all Knox County Local Schools at all grade levels. This programming encourages youth to foster healthy relationships with themselves, their peers, and their families to reduce problematic behavior such as violence and bullying while improving the perception of safety, social-emotional competence, and increasing positive school climate and culture.
New Directions offers evidence-based prevention education programs for grades K-12 students in Knox County. Due to the passing of Erin's Law in April of 2023, Ohio schools are required to provide developmentally appropriate instruction in child sexual abuse prevention to students in grades kindergarten through sixth grade. For seventh through 12th graders, schools are required to teach about dating and sexual violence prevention. New Directions fulfills Ohio's Erin's Law Requirement at no cost to you. New Directions was recently recognized for the Investor in the Future award by the Knox County Chamber of Commerce, and Excellence in Prevention by the Ohio Alliance to End Domestic Violence. Our Prevention Team understands that each child's basic needs, including safety, social belonging, self-esteem, and self-actualization, must be met to enable deeper learning and create an optimal learning environment.
Books that are included in these trainings:
My Body Belongs to Me - Pro Familia
Say Something - Peter H. Reynolds
Speak Up - Miranda Paul
I’m Happy-Sad Today - Lory Britain
Friendship is Like a Seesaw - Shona Innes and Irisz Agocs
K-3rd Grade Topics:
Body Autonomy
Friendship
Managing Feelings
Respecting Others
4th-5th Grade Topics:
Body Autonomy
Bullying
Friendship
Standing Up For Others
6th Grade Topics:
Day 1: Healthy Relationships
Day 2: Consent
Day 3: Bullying
Day 4: Bystander Intervention
7th-8th Grade Topics:
Day 1: Healthy/Unhealthy Relationships
Day 2: Consent
Day 3: Bystander Intervention
Day 4: Proactive Interventions
Topics:
Day 1: Healthy/Unhealthy Relationships
Day 2: Consent
Day 3: Bystander Intervention
Day 4: Proactive Interventions
Topics:
Healthy/Unhealthy Relationships
Consent
Bystander Intervention
Proactive Interventions
Sources of Strength is an evidence-based, upstream prevention program that employs a strength-based wellness approach to improving the health and wellbeing of individuals and communities. Sources of Strength works to give students tools to develop their strength, resilience, and help-seeking behaviors. Students will be empowered to use their voices and actively engage in learning.
Sources of Strength is an evidence-based, upstream prevention program that employs a strength-based wellness approach to improving the health and wellbeing of individuals and communities. Sources of Strength works to give students tools to develop their strength, resilience, and help-seeking behaviors. Students will be empowered to use their voices and actively engage in learning.
Session Topics:
A best practice youth suicide prevention project designed to harness the power of peer social networks to change unhealthy norms and culture, ultimately preventing suicide, bullying, and substance abuse. The mission of Sources of Strength is to prevent suicide by increasing help-seeking behaviors and promoting connections between peers and caring adults. Sources of Strength moves beyond a singular focus on risk factors by utilizing an upstream approach for youth suicide prevention. This upstream model strengthens multiple sources of support (protective factors) around young individuals so that when times get hard, they have strengths to rely on.
Adult Advisors are made up of a diverse group of connected, caring, and positive local adults whose goal is to support, mentor, and assist peer leaders in spreading hope, help, and strength-based messages across their friendship networks.
Sources of Strength Peer Leaders are a diverse group of individuals who leverage their personal and collective leadership qualities as well as their social influence in leading the charge in norming and culture change campaigns using strength-based messages to impact multiple issues including suicide.
AIM (Act. Impact, Motivate.) is a United Way of Knox County-funded program developed as a leadership program to encourage youth to ACT as leaders, IMPACT school environments in a positive way, and MOTIVATE their peers to stand for a violence-free community.
Athletes as Leaders is a research-based prevention curriculum from Futures Without Violence that aims to empower youth to take an active role in promoting healthy relationships and ending sexual violence. Youth are encouraged to be leaders in changing peer norms and school climate to a culture of safety and respect, building a positive culture within the school, and ending sexual violence. Athletes as Leaders improves participant ability to identify abusive behaviors, improve belief in gender equity, and increase self-image and confidence.
Session Topics:
Coaching Boys into Men is an evidence-based prevention curriculum from Futures Without Violence, that helps build healthy relationships and prevent violence, stopping it before it begins. This curriculum provides space for male youth to hold discussions and participate in activities that promote healthy relationship skills and beliefs that violence never equals strength. Coaching Boys into Men is proven to positively affect bystander behaviors and to reduce abuse perpetration among youth who receive the program.
Session Topics:
ROX utilizes research and evidence-based programming to simultaneously impact female youth, educate and support the female adult influencers in girls’ lives and improve the societal conditions that have the potential to negatively impact girls. ROX girls develop social, personal, and academic skills to effectively communicate, develop healthy relationships, and support others.
Session Topics:
The STAND program provides professional development training to community groups and workplaces to increase participants' knowledge of the signs of interpersonal violence, the impact of violence on the community, and ways to safely intervene, Through the power of education, our community can Stand Up, Stand Together, and Stand Against Violence.
Healthy Relationship 101 workshop provides a space for community members to learn how to discuss healthy and unhealthy relationships, consent, bystander intervention, and proactive interventions for adults. Participants will learn how to identify signs of intimate partner violence, create healthy boundaries, and communicate more effectively.
A 4-Part Series for adults with disabilities presented by Knox DD and New Directions. This series covers the following topics:
What are Relationships: Learn about different relationship types, red and green relationship flags and more!
Importance of Friendship: Learn about what to look for in a friendship, red and green friendship flags, and how to be a positive friend. Setting Boundaries: Learn about boundaries, how to set them, and the power of saying "no".
Being Safe Online: Learn about digital safety and how to identify different forms of digital abuse.
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Escalation is a compelling film that tells the story of an abusive relationship –– from its sweet beginnings to the tragic end. Throughout this workshop, participants will learn warning signs of relationship abuse, gain tools to intervene as a bystander, and identify both on and off campus resources.
Safe Zone participants learn how the LGTQ+ community is impacted by violence, LGBTQ+ vocabulary, and how to be intentionally inclusive in both personal and professional settings.
Stand Up Speak Out teaches participants basic information about domestic and sexual violence, as well as how to intervene as a bystander.
Guided by the vision of a world where children can grow up happy, healthy, and safe, New Directions provides Stewards of Children training from Darkness to Light to our community. Stewards of Children training empowers participants through education and training to prevent, recognize, and react responsibly to child sexual abuse. This training is approved for 2 hours of CEUs for social workers, nurses, and dentists.
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Hidden in Plain Sight is an interactive and informational presentation for adults funded by DELTA Impact and the Drug-Free Communities grant in collaboration with Knox Substance Abuse Action Team (KSAAT). Hidden in Plain Sight increases participants' knowledge and awareness of items that may be found in an adolescent’s room, bookbag, closet, or car that indicate risky behaviors including drug and alcohol use, teen dating violence, and suicide.
Keep Knox Safe is a training funded by DELTA Impact and the Drug-Free Communities grant in collaboration with Knox Substance Abuse Action Team (KSAAT). Keep Knox Safe is a program for the service industry that increases participants' knowledge of alcohol rules and regulations, how sexual violence is carried out in bar/restaurant settings and builds skills for intervening in problematic situations. This training adheres to DORA compliance requirements.
PACE is New Directions’ Parent and Child Education program that addresses youth facing multiple risk factors, providing space for youth and parents to learn and grow together. The PACE program includes two tracks; one for the parent or caregiver and one for the youth where they learn about healthy relationships, digital respect and safety, and risky behaviors.
Adults learn how to identify signs of intimate partner and sexual violence, build skills to help create healthy boundaries, communicate more effectively, build the bond with youth, and about the real-life experiences of youth.
Adults learn about the popular apps teens use, how to safely use apps, and the challenges teens face with social media, relationships, and consent.
Adults gain knowledge about items they may find in an adolescent’s room, bookbag, closet, or car that indicates risky behavior such as drug and alcohol abuse, teen dating violence, and suicide/mental health.
Youth learn about consent, red and green flags in relationships, different forms of abuse, and define what a healthy relationship looks like for them. Youth learn basic communication skills.
Youth learn about appropriate use of technology, how to safely use these apps, and how these apps can be used for power and control in relationships.
Youth learn about healthy ways to cope with stress, skills to set healthy boundaries intheir relationships and friendships, and how to intervene in concerning situations. Youth brainstorm their trusted adults and support networks broadly.
New Directions educates the community about healthy relationships, the connections between domestic/sexual violence, bystander intervention, and how to help in these circumstances in more ways than prevention programming, By educating community members about domestic, intimate partner, and sexual violence, we hope to shape Knox County into a place where citizens do not tolerate abuse and instead promote healthy, loving relationships.
New Directions' Table Talks Podcast provides a unique opportunity to community members to learn more about New Directions services, hear survivors’ stories, and engage in prevention messaging. From Teen Advisory Council members discussing teen dating violence to Knox County Detectives and Sexual Assault Nurse Examiners sharing their knowledge and experience with survivors, New Directions has provided Knox County with a look inside the different facets of domestic and sexual violence prevention and intervention. These episodes connect listeners with individuals who share knowledge about topics such as suicide prevention, LGBTQ+ issues, abuse, neglect, and exploitation within the elderly population, and the importance of community connectedness. New Directions provides an insight to our community by simply pressing play.
Prevention in the Park is a fun, creative way to interact with the community while teaching about healthy relationships. Each lesson plan is paired with a fun activity related to learning about relationships. This program is offered seasonally as weather permits and is tailored to a variety of ages.
Where is Prevention is a video series that engages Knox County community members through talking about various topics related to domestic violence, sexual assault, as well as creating and fostering healthy relationships.
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