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Violence Prevention Initiative Partners Launch Training Program

Shown in photo: Back row, L to R: Veronica Breen, Sheree MacDonald, Paula Buckle, Brenda Smith. Front row, L to R: Mona wall, Bonnie Woodland. Missing from photo: Keith Durdle, Paul Barron, Patricia Power

The Violence Prevention Initiative (VPI) is a government-community partnership aimed at finding long term solutions to the problem of violence as well as ways to improve services to survivors of violence. Government partners comprise: the Women's Policy Office, Health and Community Services, Human Resources and Employment, Justice, Education, and the Strategic Social Planning Unit.

On April 24-25, 2001 the VPI Partners launched the Violence Awareness and Action Training (VAAT) Program through a pilot in the St. John's region. The program is geared towards providing both government and community service providers with basic training and awareness on violence prevention and working with survivors of violence.

The program was developed by Bonnie Woodland, Consultant, Woodland Training and Development, in collaboration with Mona Wall, Manager of the VPI, with support from Sheree MacDonald, ADM of the Women's Policy Office. The VAAT program encourages networking among key government departments and regional community agencies by offering the training in an inter-agency and regional setting. the successful pilot in the St. John's region had 26 participants for the basic training and 16 for the train-the-trainer.

This cooperative endeavor was made possible through the efforts of training and policy personnel in the partner departments. These individuals included Keith Durdle, Training Officer, Department of Health and Community Services, Paul Barron and Veronica Breen, Staff Training and Development Officers, Human Resources and Employment, Patricia Power, Manager of Human Resources (training & Development) and Sgt. Paula Buckle, NCO in charge of Training Section, RNC, Justice and Brenda Smith, Director of Support Services, Education.

The future plans for the VAAT program include offering five more regional sessions throughout the province in late 2001. Some partner departments are also investigating ways to offer the program within their respective departments.

Updated December 2002.