May 23

Pre-Brainstormed ?s:

What are your primary programs and services to support victims of domestic abuse?
How do you best assist children who are exposed to these situations?
What types of legal services do you introduce to victims of domestic abuse? Do these services change if they have children? If so, how do they change?
What are some gaps in the legal services that you think should be added or taken away?
In general, what’s the first thing you would add immediately if you could?
Why was IMAGINE initiated? How does it work? How successful is it? How does bringing survivors together help individuals improve their mental and emotional health?
What are some of the most common issues you find that abuse victims and families deal with?
Are there any more uncommon facts you would like everyone to know about when it comes to victims and when it comes to their own relationships (what should people look out for that people mention even less)?
On your website, it says that you help over 800 adults and children every year. Around what percentage of the 800 are adults? What percent are women and what percent are men? What percentage of the 800 are children?
How do the legal services that The Second Step offers differ from those offered by first step shelters?
Do different laws apply to housing provided by organizations such as The Second Step (different than private housing)? (Regarding things like stalking.)
What are the most impactful changes that need to be made? What role can students (high school and college) have in preventing this?

This experience is important for our research because The Second Step is a unique community that brings together survivors, advocates, and volunteers to all assist the survivors at different stages and in different ways. More specifically, we’ll be meeting with the legal aspect of this organization with the goal of learning more about how this community benefits survivors and their children through implementing legal policies into their programs and actions.

Individual Pre-Reflections

Catherine

Although I have been to The Second Step in the past, we worked primarily with the survivors rather than the legal services. I think it will be interesting to learn about what services The Second Step provides as well as how these services differ from those provided by “first step” or emergency shelters. I hope to learn more about what we can do to bring awareness back to St. Mark’s. I also hope we are prepared and are able to ask questions that will lead the discussion in a productive manner.

Skylar

As I have never been to The Second Step before, I am really excited to talk to Ms. Ross and learn more about the organization, as well as how they work to support victims of domestic abuse (as well as their children) throughout the legal process (as well as what the legal processes in place are). I think that it is good we have some foundational questions drafted in case we need something to fill in the time, but I am hoping that our conversation with Ms. Ross flows in such a way that her responses will open up more ideas and give us more information to pursue. I also hope that she is knowledgeable, at least to an extent, regarding what policies there are to support children in these situations or even teenagers who are victims of dating violence, as I think that is the most relevant aspect of our research to bring back to St. Mark's at the end of Lion Term as well as next year.

Lydia

As we go to Second Step, I want to be able to learn and ask questions about the struggles of working with victims of domestic abuse, such as what they think the public should know about victims, and what they wish were laws to help victims that are not in place now. Also, since it is our first experience day, I want to be able to go in prepared. If we are prepared the first day, we might fall more into being prepared for the rest of the experience days as well. I think what is also important is how we work as a team. If we are organized and can work well together, we will be able to complete tasks faster and typically as a better result than if we did not work well together.

Group Debrief

Ms. Ross provided a strong foundation as to what domestic abuse is by legal standards as well as the basic legal systems in place to support victims while not talking over our heads
Ms. Ross wasn't only involved in The Second Step's support systems or solely involved in legal systems surrounding domestic abuse but knew a lot about both as well as how their lives function afterward and how the process works to support them through the law
Ms. Ross was knowledgeable about the general laws, and not just about what The Second Step specifically helps with
Note: laws are policy, but policy may encompass more than just laws in terms of who does what or what department certain laws fall under; policy is a course or principal of action as proposed by the government; policy is a statement of intent and is implemented as a procedure or protocol, and policy can lead to the law
Ms. Ross gave a lot of examples and specific stories regarding how different laws and policies can help different people in their own unique situations/why a victim would want to go through different processes depending on their situations
Ms. Ross was also aware of the follow-up and follow-throughs
Ms. Ross understands that education is essential to changing behavior, especially early education (as early as high school if not earlier); when asked what she most wishes would change, she talked about how she wants to improve education surrounding domestic abuse within the system (judges, clerks, law enforcement officers, and teachers) because not every judge or lawyer is on the victim's side due to a lack of education

Notes for the next meeting...

Ask some of the same questions (rephrase and also ask "what is the biggest impediment to ending domestic violence right now")
Going into it: worried that we weren't going to be prepared as we could've been, but the conversation flowed well; her answers gave us more questions
It was interesting to learn more about the actions that high schoolers can take individually, even before abuse becomes specifically domestic (i.e. when it's dating violence rather than domestic abuse)
Good exhibitions are interactive: don't do videos because nobody will watch them; potentially use flow charts (similar to choose your own adventure); focus on educating people (give people a short situation with a question and then tell them the answer)

Individual Reflections

Catherine

After traveling to The Second Step and meeting with Ms. Ross, the discussion and questions went better than I thought. Although we prepared questions, we did not need to use many of them and it ended up turning into a productive conversations. She shared with us the services that The Second Step provides as well as the legal services that are available to victims. She also explained to us the legal process and the different options that victims have if they are in an abusive relationship. Going forward, I think we can refine some of our questions, learn more about specific laws, and continue our preparation and planning.

Skylar

Going to The Second Step administrative office was a really informational experience because it gave us a basic understanding of how domestic abuse victims can seek more immediate, emergency-based help as well as how they can seek long-term help (including transitional living). Ms. Ross also gave us real-life examples of different survivor's experiences to better explain how the different legal processes affected or helped in varying situations.

Lydia

The experience that we shared today was very good and extremely interesting. It was a good way to get a basic understanding of the support system and legal system that surrounds domestic abuse, as well as helping us get an insight as to what people who work with victims want the public to know. Ms. Ross was also able to give us an overview and the troubles they faced for some cases that Second Step had dealt with/ was dealing with, which not only helped us learn obstacles that people face but also helped us hear true stories and make us realize this happens to everyday people.

The Second Step audio.mp4

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