Our Events
News
Our Programs - Here's How Effective They Are!
December 29, 2023
Are you wondering how effective our programming is for Black women DV survivors and their co-surviving children? If you've heard about the Youth Healthy Relationships for system-involved girls of color that we've also started and wondered about it, got that for you too. Check out this link on our YouTube channel to see the follow-up stats we've collected to make sure our goals are being met, and we've shared them with you: LINK.
Youth Healthy Relationships (formerly Youth DV Prevention)
Starts, Saturday, March 11, 2023!
The 8-week pilot for this program was completed in 2022 with great results! Youth got to be taken out to eat each week, listen to music, watch movie and TV show excerpts, learn to recognize and create healthy relationships on their unique terms, and get their peers' encouragement, thoughts, humor, and support along the way!
NEW PROGRAM LAYOUT:
This program is kicking off with all the same plusses, and...we're including an incentive each youth can spend for finishing the program! You even get a facilitator who is your age!
DATES & TIMES:
It's weekly on Saturday, starting March 11, 2023 at 1 - 3 pm, and continues weekly through April 29, 2023.
ELIGIBILITY:
-
It's for youth who are in middle school and high school
-
who can handle themselves respectfully in a group of their peers
FULL CLASS SIZE: 8
We're excited to bring it to you and your youth. NOTE: The March 2023 class is full, so click here to join the waitlist for the next class in 2023: HERE
Hip-Hope Inc.'s Many Shades of Colour Young Women's Conference: Adjusting My Crown
March 4, 2022
This annual event is something that our executive director and her children have attended and been blessed, uplifted, encouraged, and energized by attending, and we want YOU and your daughters to know about it! It's free for your daughters to participate in so do it!!
Registration opened up on 1/3/2023. Here is a link to their page that gives you a passion-filled introduction by the two powerhouse Black women co-chairs! Love what you've heard so far and want to register? Here's the link directly to that page: Link
Want to volunteer for the event to support those who will be attending? You will choose the same page link and click on "Volunteer".
Hundreds if not thousands of young women are in attendance, your girls will be fed in their bodies and their spirits - and so will you if you're there to watch like a "fly on the wall". Go! Quick! NOW! Check it out!!!
SiStar GirlTalk Local Self-Care Event
November 24, 2022
We want to make sure we consistently make available events for healing for you to investigate and choose from. As usual, it is not enough for them to be Black created and Black led; we also check to make sure the providers of these events have shown to be responsible with the wellness of Black women.
SiStars GirlTalk is the creator of the annual event Sista SoulFest that has been a positive, powerful, healing space for Black women business women and attendees alike for 4 years. Although, we have not yet had the opportunity to witness their 4 years of healing events such as the one advertised here, our Executive Director, Courageous Fire, will do her best to be in attendance for this one.
Be prayerful, ponder in meditation, seek your spiritual guidance that you rely upon, listen to your inner spirit, if you have a therapist talk this over with them as well, then decide whether you are feeling led to attend.
The Facebook event link for more information is included HERE
Youth DV Prevention™ Program
Pilot Results
September 3, 2022
Part of what we get to fund from our 2022-2023 funding partners at United Way of Central Iowa is our Youth DV Prevention™ pilot!
We finished at the end of August 2022, and the results are powerful! What a wonderful thing - to prevent this from happening to our youth before it happens!!
Take a look at these results then...
Sign up your youth for the full cohort that will take place in 3-6 months HERE
![20220901_194934[1]_edited.png](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/e934a4_1b27432147a246ae92401d5fe5523508~mv2.png/v1/fill/w_782,h_440,al_c,q_85,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_auto/20220901_194934%5B1%5D_edited.png)
Personal Security™ Program
Pilot Results
September 3, 2022
We're so thankful that through a Community Grant from our partners at Polk County Decategorization & County Community Partnerships for Protecting Children we were able to conduct this powerful pilot!
Beautifuls, this group was incredible for its participants.
After being taught then assessed by a martial arts Black belt master,
100% of the class now knows:
What self defense is:
What you allow into your mental, physical, and spiritual space
De-escalating potential fighting scenarios through communication
When getting physical is necessary, knowing how to execute it quickly and accurately
90% of the class can execute in specific scenarios of executing self defense
100% of the class knows how to form their fist and position their body to execute self defense
100% of the class knows where to hit and where not to hit
100% of the class knows how to strike, maim, and mitigate harm from an assailant
Take a look at where the confidence levels of these Beautifuls and their children started and where they finished at the post-pilot survey below after just 6 weeks!
Our demographic told us how important it is to have this type of empowerment, so we're pursuing funding to make this a permanent part of our programming. Stay tuned for how YOU can help!
Funding for Fiscal Year 2022-2023: United Way
July 11, 2022
You know we were funded for 6 months from United Way for our Empowerment through the Arts™ (prevention of future predatory cycles for Black women) and the pilot for Eleven24 (DV prevention for youth). We were just funded for the fiscal year of 2022-2023! Stay tuned to see what we get to do, how you or your youth can be included, or how you can support it!
Summer Grant 2022: Polk County Decategorization
July 11, 2022
We're excited to announce we have a one-time grant from Polk County Decategorization to pilot our Personal Security™ program! We're thrilled to be able to pilot this program to give Black women DV survivors and their families the confidence to know they can protect themselves using only their body as a weapon. Stay tuned for outcomes!