TDVAM & Black History Month 2023: Health Equity Matters

“This country owes the innovation, wisdom, and passion of young Black leaders who go unnoticed and unnamed in mainstream history books.” – Why Young Black Leaders Aren’t Only our Future, but Also our Now

February is both Teen Dating Violence Awareness & Prevention Month (TDVAM) and Black History Month. This year, the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence (NRCDV) is honored to partner with and amplify the voices of Black youth leaders throughout the month of February and beyond. “We know that Black youth carry the defiance and brilliance of our ancestors, and we honor them as producers of knowledge and creators of social change,” says Patty Branco.

NRCDV is excited to share our theme for TDVAM 2023, Health Equity Matters: Making Connections Through Experiences, inspired by the youth-led planning group for our upcoming National Prevention Youth Summit. Promoting health equity, specifically for Black youth, fosters healthy individuals, relationships, and communities. Our focus responds to the charge to pay attention to what matters most to youth, and to take action, as emphasized through love is respect’s theme for TDVAM 2023, Be About It.

Additionally, NRCDV will be launching our new messaging campaign, By & For: Stories of the Beauty, Power, & Wisdom Within, this month in recognition of TDVAM and Black History Month. Living out our values through equitable compensation, intentional leadership, and liberative structures, this campaign centers Black youth experiences, focusing on storytelling and prevention in conjunction with #1Thing. Check out this blog post to learn more about the youth activists spearheading this project.

Ready to take action to promote health equity for Black youth? Check out our exciting opportunities for engagement below!

Upcoming events

• Webinar: The Lifespan Lens: Youth-Centered Approaches to Building Economic Security and Safety in Housing Programs on Tuesday 2/21 2pm Eastern | 11am Pacific – Join NRCDV’s Safe Housing Capacity Building Center for a panel discussion focused on ways to engage youth in program design. REGISTER
• 2023 National Youth Prevention Summit - Health Equity Matters: Making Connections Through Experiences on Monday 2/27 & Tuesday 2/28 at 4pm Eastern | 1pm Pacific – Our inaugural summit will explore the ways in which promoting health equity for youth is critical to building healthy relationships and communities. REGISTER 

Resources to learn more

• Prevention Tool of the Month: Pride Peace Prevention – Through the Pride Peace Prevention project, the Youth Violence Prevention Resource Center works to cultivate a positive racial identity and foster community dialogue around difficult issues in order to raise critical consciousness, promote racial justice, and reduce youth violence.
• Toolkit: Runaway & Homeless Youth and Relationship Violence Toolkit – Developed by and for advocates in the runaway and homeless youth and domestic and sexual assault fields, this toolkit was updated in 2022 to help service providers better address relationship violence with runaway and homeless youth.
• Podcast: Anti-Blackness and Primary Prevention – In this episode of PIVOT Towards Promising Futures from Futures Without Violence, Arlene Vassell of NRCDV reflects on the primary prevention inherent in Black families and communities that gets overlooked because of assumptions and biases, and calls on us to examine how we define primary prevention. Vassell calls on us to listen to the stories Black families and survivors, get creative with our funding, and use our imagination to BE the work in resisting anti-Blackness.
• Webinar Recording: Moving Power: Authentically Engaging Youth in the Community to Prevent Sexual and Intimate Partner Violence – Guests described opportunities to engage youth in civic engagement, build trusting relationships with youth for program leadership, and create space for youth to lead social justice efforts.
• NRCDV Radio Podcast: Joy, Pride & Passion of Youth Activism – In this NRCDV Radio podcast production, we explore the pride, passion, creativity, and joy of youth activism. Learn how community care and action expands how we look at prevention, and how digital activism has challenged traditional social, economic, and political norms.
• Webinar Recording: Meaningful Partnerships to Support Youth at the Intersections of Homelessness and Gender-Based Violence – This webinar examines the scope and unique characteristics of relationship violence amongst runaway and homeless youth, and explores the why and the how of building and sustaining effective community collaborations to best serve youth at the intersections.
• Podcast: Hope, Prevention and the Power of Young People – In this podcast, PreventConnect talks with Arlene Vassell of the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence and Angela Lee of  love is respect about the power of youth to prevent teen dating violence and the role of mainstream agencies and organizations to support youth, teens, and young adults.
• DELTA FOCUS Story: Engaging Youth in IPV Prevention – This story features lessons from five community coalitions funded by four DELTA FOCUS domestic violence coalitions. Their approaches focus on building youth’s leadership skills, engaging them in shifting norms related to violence, and strengthening community-level protective factors for intimate partner violence.
• TAQ: How can my domestic violence organization thoughtfully create and sustain a youth advisory board? – This Technical Assistance Question of the Month (TAQ) explores how developing a youth advisory board can be a great way to ensure that Black youths’ voices guide your work in a meaningful way.
• TAQ: How can we create meaningful connections with youth leaders seeking opportunities to become vocal advocates for themselves and their communities? – In this TAQ, guest blogger Rebecca Balog from National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center talked with Tanae LeClaire, NativeLove  Youth Delegate from the Yankton Sioux tribe about important things to remember when planning to develop relationships with youth leaders and planning outreach activities.
• Special Collection: Preventing and Responding to Teen Dating Violence – This Special Collection emphasizes collaborative and multi-level approaches to the prevention of and response to teen dating violence. Drawing on the work of many organizations, this Collection provides general information about teen dating violence, as well as resources for different populations.