Support Community-Led Solutions
Address the Root Causes of Violence
Address the Root Causes of Violence
Create Supportive,
Safe Environments
Support Community-Led Solutions
The Deborah DeBare Domestic Violence Prevention Fund (DVPF) funds community-based projects that address the root causes of violence. The DVPF also supports services for children who witness domestic violence. One goal of the DVPF grant program is to address health disparities by supporting prevention strategies led by the community, with a focus on engaging and affirming youth of color, LGBTQ+, Two-Spirit, and gender nonconforming youth, and youth with disabilities. As a state, we must strengthen our investment in the DVPF to break the cycle of abuse and prevent IPV before it happens in the first place.
Implementation Projects
DVPF Implementation Projects focus on addressing shared risk and protective factors for violence and on altering norms, policies, and community conditions to prevent IPV before it starts
Progreso Latino received approximately $50,000 annually to utilize a holistic public health approach to grow the community’s capacity to address intimate partner violence (IPV) in the Blackstone Valley area.
Progreso Latino engages community members to mobilize around common goals towards social change and policy change. Members of its Adult Social Action Committee build leadership skills to become involved in the issues impacting their community. Participants partner with local policy coalitions and are active in state-level policy campaigns, such as driver’s licenses for all and health insurance for undocumented children. Through this project, Progreso Latino also engages young people and survivors and aims to increase community connectedness to prevent domestic violence.
*The grant period for this Implementation Project is January 2020 through June 2023.
Sojourner House received approximately $50,000 annually to implement the Peer Advocacy Zone (PAZ), in collaboration with local organizations and schools. As the work continued, PAZ evolved to become The Sojo SPARKs (Supporting Peers and Raising Knowledge) peer education group.
With the support of this funding, Sojourner House educates and empowers young people to become leaders in teen dating violence prevention within their schools and communities. As peer leaders, the young people develop awareness projects and provide educational workshops to their peers.
*The grant period for this Implementation Project is January 2020 through June 2023.
Nowell Academy, a public charter high school serving pregnant and parenting youth, received a $50,284 Implementation Project annual award to launch the school’s Safe and Supported Counseling Center (SSCC), in partnership with Dorcas International Institute of Rhode Island.
The SSCC was designed to be a peer-to-peer intimate partner violence (IPV) prevention and response center, with a focus on meeting the needs of unaccompanied minors at risk of IPV. Unaccompanied minors are youth under eighteen years old who have migrated to the country without a lawful status in the U.S. and who have no parent or legal guardian available to care for them. Nowell Academy students would be empowered and trained to provide education, advocacy and support to their peers and receive a stipend as peer counselors.
With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Nowell Academy’s project plans and objectives changed as they navigated challenges such as the shift to distance learning, students’ lack of access to technology, and the disruption of in-person client advocacy services. The peer counselor training curriculum was successfully developed and piloted with a small group of students in the spring of 2020; however, the focus of the project turned to supporting at-risk youth during the crisis in order to decrease the risk factors for IPV.
In early 2021, Nowell Academy’s project pivoted to focus on enhancing students’ social-emotional learning and increasing their awareness and skills in developing and maintaining healthy relationships. The project would continue to implement a model of incentivizing at-risk youth to participate in prevention programs and compensating students for their time through leadership stipends as they became healthy relationship ambassadors within the school community. The Trusting Ties Healthy Relationships Group was piloted in the spring of 2021 with a small cohort of students.
Dorcas International Institute was an active funded partner on Nowell Academy’s project, promoting protective factors among youth who are unaccompanied minors in order to decrease the risk of IPV. Support from the DVPF provided Dorcas International the ability to offer groups for youth clients focused on healthy relationships, positive attitudes and behaviors, and artistic expression and to provide program incentives and stipends.
Nowell Academy’s funding ended in June 2021.
YWCA Rhode Island received a $55,000 Implementation Project annual award from 2017 to 2019. Their DVPF project focused on training educators, youth workers, service providers, and community members on the historical and current ways institutional and structural racism impact girls of color and on providing a proven practice for building resiliency in girls.
“Our project recognizes that girls of color are often overlooked when community members, service providers, and educators address issues of gender and racial inequality, and its relationship to intimate partner violence. It is a clarion call to all of our better selves to highlight the unique struggles of girls of color and ask what we as individuals and as part of larger organizations can do to improve our society by raising awareness and focusing on altering norms, polices, and community conditions that impact girls of color.” – Deborah Perry, President/CEO
YWCA Rhode Island provided racial justice training to over 100 people, and also trained 60 youth workers in Girls Circle, an evidence-based prevention program for building resiliency in girls.
Community Micro-grants
Community Micro-grants are short-term projects that foster and increase community cohesion through public awareness, education, and the arts. The goal of these projects is to help community members make a personal connection to the issue of intimate partner violence prevention and encourage bystanders to take action and get involved in their schools and communities.
Conexión Latina Newport received a $12,500 micro-grant to create a 6-month educational program on intimate partner violence, aiming to serve the Hispanic community of Newport and specifically Hispanic youth and LGBTQ+ youth and adults. The program will include a series of educational workshops, facilitated in partnership with Day One, that focus on both the participants’ own relationship health and the community work needed to prevent domestic violence. Participants will also create a social media and print campaign in Spanish, to be distributed in collaboration with Newport Out, the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center’s LEAD Program, and the Newport Health Equity Zone. The campaign will be designed by the community it aims to serve, with a goal of reaching 70% of Newport’s Spanish-speaking community.
The Step Up Center received a $9,500 micro-grant to build a community of youth and elder mentors who are trained to assist victims of domestic violence. The goal of the project is to expand on the work of The Step Up Center, empowering victims and assisting them along their healing journey. The program will include a series of empowerment workshops, the distribution of educational materials, and healing through art and play therapy and other holistic techniques. The program will be co-led by a member of the RICADV survivor task force SOAR (Sisters Overcoming Abusive Relationships), who has advocated with SOAR for over 20 years.
East Bay Community Action Program (EBCAP) received a $7,000 micro-grant to deliver a queer-centered intimate partner violence prevention and safer sex education program to RI high schools and colleges. The main goals of the project are to increase the number of LGBTQ+ youth and young adults who have access to queer-focused IPV and sexual health educational materials, and to empower students to make healthier decisions around relationships, dating, sex, reproductive health, and seeking support. The program will be run by EBCAP’s Trans Whole Health Program Director (TWHD), whose presentations will provide a valuable opportunity for students to connect with an adult who has been where they are now. The program is in large part based on Advocates for Youth’s Rights, Respect, Responsibility: A K-12 Curriculum (3Rs), an LGBTQ+ inclusive sexual health curriculum.
Young Voices received a $14,000 micro-grant to expand their 2023 Youth-Led Summit, which will serve more than 100 low-income youth in Providence, Cranston, Pawtucket, and Central Falls. A main goal of the summit is to create a safe, welcoming, youth-led space for young people to discuss and train in topics related to Domestic Violence Prevention Fund priority areas, such as affirming LGBTQ+ and gender non-conforming youth, healthy relationships, and intimate partner violence prevention. Young Voices will create educational packets containing resources about domestic violence and provide group facilitation in both English and Spanish.
Refugee Dream Center received a $15,000 micro-grant to continue and expand a program to empower a cohort of refugee youth of color and train them in domestic violence awareness. The Refugee Youth Domestic Violence Prevention Project was originally established through a 2022 DVPF grant, and because of its popularity, is being expanded to more participants this year. The goals of the program are to build awareness among the participating youth and broader community about domestic violence in culturally appropriate ways, reduce barriers to accessing resources and services, equip participants with the knowledge and skills to educate their peers, and ultimately prevent domestic violence amongst Rhode Island refugees.
Sojourner House received a $15,000 micro-grant to pilot a Coaching Boys into Men (CBIM) program for athletic coaches and staff in RI. CBIM is an evidence-based prevention program developed by Futures Without Violence and rigorously evaluated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The purpose of CBIM is to train and motivate high school coaches to teach young male athletes healthy relationship skills and that violence never equals strength. This program will consist of virtual and in-person training sessions, as well as monthly office hours to further support and motivate coaches. The goal is to train at least 50 coaches, who will in turn reach young athletes in partnered school districts with diverse populations of students, such as Woonsocket.
ARISE (Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education) received a $15,000 micro-grant to expand the Junior Flames program and implement the middle school-level Identity Series. Junior Flames is a student-centered leadership, academic, and social-personal development program for middle school-aged youth, co-created by ARISE team members and youth as part of a 2022 DVPF micro-grant. The goals of this year’s program are to build dialogue around healthy relationships, build awareness about identity development, improve school culture, and foster youth empowerment around relationships. ARISE will implement elements of the evidence-informed One Circle Foundation model and will serve middle school students of color in public and private schools in the Providence, Cranston, Pawtucket, Warwick, and East Greenwich districts.
Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE) received a $15,000 micro-grant to implement Junior Flames, a student-centered leadership, academic, and social-personal development program for middle school-aged youth. Co-created by the youth, Junior Flames currently consists of 13 young people from Providence, Cranston, Warwick and East Greenwich school districts. The youth will attend weekly workshops to increase self-efficacy around identifying different types of abuse and signs of healthy and unhealthy interactions. They plan to create a digital mural alongside a Tik Tok awareness campaign to empower their peers to recognize and disrupt physical, verbal and emotional abuse, emphasizing healthy relationships and community healing through the arts. The youth will also read and discuss the book Young Revolutionary: A Teen’s Guide to Activism by Chanice Lee, during an interactive training series created by ARISE’s Anti-Racist Educator. The training series will support the middle school cohort with education and tools to advocate effectively, sustainably and successfully around the issues that matter to them. Junior Flames is a space where young people can be their authentic selves and learn and unlearn together.
The Empowerment Factory received a $4,000 micro-grant to help support a 10-week after-school restorative justice art program for elementary school and middle school-aged young people enrolled at Sackett Recreation Center, culminating in a community mural project. The goal of the program is to utilize art-making to build positive social and emotional skills for youth ages 5-15. The program will integrate restorative justice practices to encourage a shared sense of accountability among young people, their educators and mentors, and community members, with the aim of building a thriving community culture committed to authentic relationships.
The Katie Brown Educational Program (KBEP) received a $4,000 micro-grant to provide professional development for school administrators, educators, counselors and nurses across public school districts in Rhode Island. KBEP aims to empower young people and adults to play an active role in addressing and reducing the factors that contribute to sexual and dating violence. The professional development sessions will provide districts the opportunity to address issues related to relationship violence and teach safe, healthy alternatives to violence in their schools. These workshops will bring together adults in the community who are responsible for guiding, educating or mentoring students and give them the training to recognize the presence or potential presence of violent behaviors.
New Bridges for Haitian Success (NB4HS) received a $15,000 micro-grant to develop and disseminate print materials in Haitian-Creole that include resources and information about domestic violence. NB4HS will engage its own staff as well as leaders from faith-based organizations to participate in a series of workshops and forums related to domestic violence prevention, working with them to strengthen their ability to support victims of domestic violence. Thirdly, NB4HS will continue to advocate existing systems that address intimate partner violence to enhance culturally competent services and responses.
Providence Housing Authority (PHA) received a $15,000 micro-grant to enhance PHA’s Victim Support Program to help prevent intimate partner violence among residents of color, residents who are LGBTQ+ and residents who are disabled, under the age of 25. PHA will collect qualitative and quantitative baseline data as part of this project, and will work with LGBTQ+ youth service organizations to provide trainings to PHA staff. The goal is for PHA to implement consistent intervention and prevention strategies agency-wide in order to better respond to and prevent intimate partner violence and be able to conduct safety planning with victims of domestic violence who identify as LGBTQ+. The PHA will also strive to actively engage young LGBTQ+ residents through community building events and by establishing a Peace Ambassadors team.
The Refugee Dream Center received a $15,000 micro-grant to train a cohort of 10 refugee youth in domestic violence awareness over the course of eight months. The goal is to build a support network for the young people to help address the root causes of domestic violence from a culturally responsive perspective. The program will aim to equip refugee youth with valuable tools to respond to and prevent incidents of domestic violence, tailored specifically to their backgrounds and their own experiences of trauma.
Youth In Action received a $15,000 micro-grant to partner with The Gentlemen’s Academy to pilot the Ten Young Men program with adolescent male-identified youth. The program builds on the model of Ten Men, a prevention strategy of the RICADV that engages adult men in the community to play an active role in ending domestic violence. This effort will focus on the recruitment of 5-10 young men in 8th-12th grade within the Providence Public School District to participate in a cohort where they receive education, support and coaching from peers and adult allies, based on the Ten Men approach of “Engage, educate, mobilize.”
Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE) received a $10,000 micro-grant to prevent multiple forms of violence, including teen dating violence and suicide, among Southeast Asian youth through Junior Flames, a student-centered leadership, academic, and social-personal development program for middle school-aged youth.
Progreso Latino received a $7,950 micro-grant to expand its multilingual, culturally responsive health communications campaign and to continue its efforts to address food insecurity among Latinos and immigrants in Rhode Island through the Central Falls Food Pantry.
Youth In Action received a $10,000 micro-grant in support of its work to create spaces for youth to build and practice leadership skills, with a focus on social-emotional support and identity development. Funding supported youth-led Action Groups aiming to create social and systemic change in the community. Action Groups focused on outdoor equity, language justice, ending youth homelessness, and ending domestic violence.
Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE) received a $10,000 micro-grant to address teen dating violence and other forms of intimate partner violence in the Southeast Asian community through its culturally-responsive Hidden Lotus program for high-school aged youth. Program participants developed a video public service announcement (PSA) to be shared with the community and on social media. Hidden Lotus shifted to a hybrid in-person/virtual model to adapt to public health guidance and restrictions in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Partnership for Providence Parks received a $7,950 micro-grant to support a 10-week youth-centered Restorative Art program in collaboration with Providence ¡CityArts! for Youth. The program aimed to strengthen youth participants’ connection to one another and their community and to build social-emotional skills, such as compassion and communication. The program would culminate in the creation of a community mural. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was not possible to implement the proposed project. The Partnership for Providence Parks pivoted to research, develop, and curate ARTKits! which were take-home kits available at free meal sites throughout the summer. Offering these kits supported the effort to get youth to the meal sites and provided them with meaningful do-it-yourself at-home art-making activities while stay-at-home orders were in effect.
Meeting Street received a $10,000 micro-grant to expand their multi-generational primary prevention programs, in particular to engage middle school-aged boys through the One Circle Foundation’s evidence-informed model The Council for Boys and Young Men. Funding also supported Meeting Street in expanding the survivor-led Women’s Circle peer support and empowerment group, which includes parents enrolled in the organization’s early childhood programs.
Domestic Violence Resource Center (DVRC) received a $4,208 micro-grant to empower young people and promote community-wide understanding and LGBTQ+ acceptance by hosting a Gay Prom, an event that celebrates and elevates awareness of marginalized populations like queer youth in South County.
Meeting Street received a $5,800 micro-grant to develop an intimate partner violence staff training plan to help build the capacity of their staff to support families experiencing violence.
Rhode Island Cross-Campus Learning Collaborative for Sexual Violence Prevention (through Day One) received a $5,000 micro-grant to launch a traveling photography exhibit featuring Kate Ryan’s Signed, X project in April, national Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
Adoption Rhode Island received a $13,022 micro-grant to educate youth in the foster care system using the evidence-based curriculum Safe Dates. The goal was for youth to then create an artistic expression of what they learned through Safe Dates to help raise awareness of dating violence in the community.
Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE) received a $15,000 micro-grant to adapt One Circle Foundation’s evidence-based curriculum and offer a culturally responsive, 50-hour group for Southeast Asian youth to discuss healthy relationships, trauma, social and personal development, and communication.
Blackstone Valley Community Action Program received a $9,512 micro-grant to educate high school age youth of varying gender, sexual orientation, religion, race, and national origin in Pawtucket and Central Falls in order to overcome stereotypes and raise education levels in the community about dating violence. The goal was for these youth to in turn provide peer-based training to other youth, and spread knowledge throughout the community.
Elizabeth Buffum Chace Center received a $1,950 micro-grant to deliver the Decoding Your Teen curriculum to foster parents, kinship care providers, group home staff, DCYF social caseworkers, and other caretakers of youth involved in DCYF care.
Katie Brown Educational Program received a $15,000 micro-grant to work with existing student clubs at Central, Classical, Mt. Pleasant, and Hope High Schools and the Juanita Sanchez Educational Complex to aid students in crafting a 30-minute student-led assembly for their peers. Project goals also included developing testimonials, a website, and two “healthy relationship check-in” events for students.
Progreso Latino received a $15,000 micro-grant to offer a Grassroots Film & Discussion Series in Spanish, with a focus on engaging Latino boys and men in the Blackstone Valley area in discussions that explore the role of machismo in domestic violence prevention.
Princes 2 Kings received a $5,000 micro-grant to engage male youth in conversations about healthy masculinity in an effort to develop an educational stop motion animation film addressing teen dating violence.
Youth In Action (YIA) received a $9,755 micro-grant to develop and implement a youth-led film and discussion series for young people in Providence. YIA also trained staff on how to recognize and respond to teen dating violence and make referrals for youth and families experiencing intimate partner violence.
Helpline Available 24/7
The confidential statewide Helpline can be reached by calling 1-800-494-8100 or using the online chat here. The Helpline is for all victims of violent crime, including domestic and dating abuse, and those looking for more information to help a victim of violence