Pathways For Change Inc

The unique role of a rape crisis center requires that we support our community while we work to identify and dismantle damaging myths and belief systems. We understand that sexual assault is rooted in the very fabric of our society, is fueled by media images, and is influenced by forms of oppression, especially sexism and racism. While rape is perpetrated mostly by men against women, anyone can be a victim or perpetrator - regardless of age, gender, sexual orientation, education, race, socioeconomic background, or religion. When someone is sexually assaulted, the trauma can be experienced differently for each person and each survivor's response is shaped by their background, including their experiences as targets of oppression. As a societal problem, addressing the roots of the problem include addressing the underlying oppressions that contribute to a society that places women and children most at risk, while maintaining the myths that leave many survivors feeling themselves to blame for the violence that was perpetrated against them. The sense of shame and guilt evoked by these myths about sexual assault can also lead survivors to feel completely alone and isolated after an attack and can lead communities to isolate, rather than protect the victim and support, rather than hold accountable, the perpetrator.

While part of the role of Pathways is to raise awareness of the incidence and myths about sexual assault, we also have a role in building and expanding the resiliency factors and strengths of communities. By working in positive ways toward shared goals with the community, we can have an impact on the root causes of sexual assault. We recognize that every community has resiliency factors that can be identified and enhanced. By enhancing these factors, we play a role in proactive prevention, by changing the community conditions that affect the incidence and impact of sexual assault. Resiliency factors can be based in societal institutions such as anti-violence programs in schools and effective policies for creating safe schools, practices within medical institutions that train personnel to screen for sexual assault and to handle disclosures, and systems of accountability for perpetrators. Other factors are based collectively in individuals such as community connections of family and friends, capacity to cope with difficult feelings and work toward recovery from violence. In our prevention work, the content of our presentations and community discussions are aimed at enhancing resiliency factors in a variety of ways:

• We enhance the general knowledge, and help individuals identify as agents for
change.
• We work to improve systems of reporting and coordination of services.
• We enhance the network of support for survivors.
• We challenge the myths related to sexual violence.
• We support the development of programs and activities that strengthen families,
build community, and challenge isolation.

The commitment of our organization's founders continues today to lead the way toward a safer community while addressing the aftermath of violence for survivors. This has required that we build our leadership and expertise in the emerging field of violence prevention. We understand that we balance our multiple roles as educators, counselors, advocates, leaders, and activists. For us, these roles fit within the framework of community organizing. We realize our early prevention efforts, along with other rape crisis centers, were primarily focused on raising awareness about the incidence, dynamics, impact, and sociological underpinnings of sexual assault. While we are proud of our history in this work, we understand that in order to truly move toward a safer community, that we must lead this work with a vision, a clear picture of a society free of sexual violence. We embrace current thinking and strategies emerging from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and look forward to continuing to learn and adopt promising and effective strategies in this pioneering work. Our community organizing framework lends itself to being in the forefront of sexual violence prevention, because it has room for flexibility and adaptation as new ideas emerge.

The overall goal of our prevention efforts is to change social norms within communities to reduce the perpetration of sexual assault across the lifespan. Our activities are organized around three objectives: 1) Promotion of healthy, respectful, developmentally-appropriate relationships and sexuality based on the human rights of sexual autonomy and bodily integrity, 2) Promotion of community-wide responsibility for consistently supportive responses to survivors and for holding abusers accountable, 3) Sexual assault prevention community organizing and leadership utilizing culturally-appropriate strategies of community development, education, mobilization and professional training. As part of an overall strategy to reduce the incidence of sexual assault, activities reflect current principles of effective primary prevention strategies. Rather than focusing on limiting negative behavior and experiences, we focus on building community resiliency and protective factors within the general community and specific populations.

The work of Pathways and its expertise and depth in the field of sexual violence has been recognized over the years by organizations as varied as the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, the Massachusetts Office of Victims Assistance, the Massachusetts Council of Human Service Providers, and the United Way of Central Massachusetts.

Our experience in hotline management dates back to 1973. We have refined our work; incorporated data gained through evaluation, and responded to changes in the social service and political environments. In 1995, Pathways was successful in procuring the state's statewide Spanish language Helpline, Llámanos y hablemos and continued to manage it until 2009. Pathways was integral in generating the concept for this Helpline and applied its experience and expertise in establishing the nation's first hotline for Spanish-speaking survivors.

We are leaders in the provision of individual and group counseling, advocacy, and supported referral services. We understand and integrate the needs of sexual assault survivors while we focus on the goals of providing culturally diverse and appropriate services to people of all cultures and communities within our area. We operate from a strength-based model of empowerment, meaning that we support survivors in building support networks, and emphasizing their strengths in coping with crisis. We understand that systems advocacy, especially within the medical and criminal justice systems, is a key part of supporting the safety and recovery needs of survivors and is a unique and crucial role of rape crisis centers. Our approach in advocacy is to assure that survivors' rights within systems are in the forefront and that survivors have the information and support they need to make the best choices possible for themselves. We not only have offered accompaniment through these systems, including round the clock emergency room advocacy and legal advocacy, but we have worked on improving the systems overall.

We were one of the moving forces to shape the public policy regarding client record confidentiality. Pathways, along with other rape crisis centers, led the way for developing survivor informed judicial policy by taking numerous stands regarding confidentiality. Because of our policy to follow the law regarding counselor privilege, we were party to several legal precedents established through the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court that helped to solidify the legal privilege for rape crisis counselors.

Pathways has extensive experience in professional training. The Agency has sponsored several community-wide conferences and has served on panel discussions and community forums related to the issues of sexual and domestic violence. We have delivered trainings to police, mental health professionals, health care personnel, nurses, teachers, clergy, and other social service workers, including a targeted effort toward workers in disability service organizations.

For more than 40 years, Pathways for Change has been the leading voice on the issues of sexual assault and abuse within Central Massachusetts. Staff at Pathways were involved as early as 1982 in the development of the first statewide training manual developed in partnership with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, and helped establish the first statewide Sexual Assault Coalition. Through the years staff from Pathways have provided leadership in the ongoing development of the anti-rape movement, especially in the area of cultural diversity and anti-oppression. Pathways provides tailored services for specific populations, while it maintains a commitment to the entire community. Currently, priority populations include communities of color, Youth and college populations, communities of Deaf and Hard of Hearing survivors, and the GLBQTI communities. In addition, people from urban neighborhoods and rural communities remain key in our efforts.

Through our prevention work, we are leaders in building and expanding the resiliency factors and strengths of communities. This frames our prevention work in positive and proactive terms so that we can play a role in changing the community conditions that affect the incidence and impact of sexual assault. In our prevention work, the content of our presentations and community discussions are aimed at enhancing resiliency factors in a variety of ways:

• We enhance the general knowledge, and help individuals identify as agents for change.
• We work to improve systems of reporting and coordination of services.
• We enhance the network of support for survivors.
• We challenge the myths related to sexual violence.
• We support the development of programs and activities that strengthen families, build
community, and challenge isolation.
• We provide leadership and training opportunities for individuals of all backgrounds to
get involved in organizing their communities.