Pace will be hosting Hope’s Door’s fifteenth annual Teen Symposium on Fri., Oct. 18.
Hope’s Door will be facilitating a day-long symposium specifically designed for high school students all over the country and will be providing workshops for teens as well as for educators. The symposium will be held in Willcox Gym and will run from 8:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m.
The students attending the conference will be introduced to the issues of dating abuse, engaged in a group dialogue about the issues at hand, and be spoken to by the Students Terminating Abusive Relationships (STAR) Peer Leadership Program, who will be encouraging them to make a difference.
One of Hope’s Door’s slogans for the symposium is, “Our Goal is to provide an interactive experi- ence where students can hear and be heard about relationships!”
Pace students and other high school students will join together to listen to the speeches by victims of domestic violence and other relevant speakers. With the group setting of the symposium and the dialogues that will follow the speeches, the goal is to provide students with a comfortable and safe setting in order to realize that help is there.
“Hope’s Door seeks to end domestic violence and to empower victims to achieve safety, independence, and healing from the trauma of abuse,” according to the mission statement of Hope’s Door.
As part of the symposium, students will learn the signs of domestic violence as well as the forms that it can take. Many students, those in relationships or not, may not be aware of the different types of domestic violence and part of the symposium’s goal is to clarify them.
Domestic violence and dat- ing abuse is not only physical violence. In order to create an awareness of the fact that abuse comes in many forms, Hope’s Door continues to reach out to the community spreading knowledge and advocating for action against those committing this violence.
Directly defined by Hope’s Door, domestic violence is “violence in an intimate relationship exhibiting a pattern of coercive tactics that can include physical, psychological, sexual, economic, and emotional abuse and is perpetrated with the goal of establishing and maintaining power and control.”
As part of Hope’s Door’s goal to expand knowledge and create a safer environment for all types of people, without discriminating race, gender, economic background, or sexual orientation, they have recently incorporated a new hotline that is more connective. With the new implementation of Skype, this creates a more personal way to look for help.
“Teens and individuals seeking advice or information on how to deal with domestic abuse can now simply call our Skype contact when it is live, and can speak with a licensed counselor on these issues,” Hope’s Door intern Adam Rivera said. “With access to the internet our organization can now expand much further beyond Westchester and hopefully, maybe the nation.”
The new advancement and incorporation of technology is an accomplishment for Hope’s Door and for counseling as a whole. With new technological advances, Hope’s Door continues to maintain an easy and reliable way for victims to contact them for help.
According to the National Dating Abuse Helpline, 1.5 million high school students nationwide experience some form of physical abuse from a dating partner in just one year.
Organizations such as Hope’s Door provide help to those that need advice and counseling by means of a telephone hotline available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and via its new Skype hotline open with live contacts.
Students that are interested in helping to join the fight against domestic violence and dating abuse or who would like to learn more about Hope’s Door are encouraged to attend the Teen Domestic violence Symposium on Fri. Oct. 18. Hope’s Door Counselors as well as STAR Peer Leadership staff will be available to speak at the event.