The mission of Project PAVE is to empower youth to end the cycle of relationship violence. The agency’s goal is to stop the generational cycle of emotional, sexual, and physical abuse within families through violence prevention, education, and intervention services.
Project PAVE is proud to have celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2006. The agency’s founders established Project PAVE in 1986 in conjunction with a tragic incident in which a well-known attorney who was representing a woman in a domestic violence case was shot and paralyzed by her client’s estranged husband. Understanding that children exposed to violence often become victims or perpetrators later in life, the agency’s programs are tailored to the meet the unique needs of children and youth who are victims and/or witnesses of physical assault, sexual assault, child abuse, domestic violence, and teen dating violence.
Project PAVE’s programs implement two effective strategies: awareness and outreach that prevent violence and often results in the identification of victims of violence, followed by clinical counseling that addresses the impact of violence on victims and their families. Because Project PAVE partners with elementary, middle, and high schools throughout our community, many PAVE clients are students in the schools identified as victims of relationship violence or are referred by area youth service providers.
Although domestic violence, teen dating violence and child abuse are found in all communities, Project PAVE focuses its resources on underserved populations. We work primarily with low-income families and provide bilingual/bicultural services to the Hispanic community.
School-Based Programs
Teen Dating Violence
High School. Targeting the problem of teen dating violence, Project PAVE researched, created and now presents a six-day high school curriculum that covers key concepts like identifying warning signs of abusive dating relationships, gender role socialization, power groups, and healthy dating behaviors.
Middle School. Styled specifically for middle school students as they begin to explore dating relationships, PAVE implements a six-day, research-based, skill-development workshop to help students know how to identify a healthy relationship.
Gender-Specific Psycho-education Groups. Designed to guide middle and high school students, gender specific groups assist youth with learning relationship skills; establishing healthy boundaries; identifying role models; and discussing cultural and societal pressures that impact their relationships.
Peer Leadership Training. Project PAVE trains interested teens to serve as peer educators for their friends and classmates in Teen Dating Violence Prevention.
School Based Counseling & Prevention
Onsite Counseling & School-wide Prevention. Masters-level counselors working full-time in partner schools conduct individual and group counseling, onsite, throughout the school year. Recognizing that student success depends on the support of parents, siblings, friends and teachers, Project PAVE also provides supportive services like parenting education, family meetings, and one-on-one consultation for family members and teachers of those students. Project PAVE currently partners with Columbine Elementary and North Middle School, providing onsite counseling and school-wide violence prevention education classes. Prevention programming is tailored to meet the unique needs of school communities. In addition to educating students, parents and staff are engaged through discussion groups, training and workshops.
Clinical Program
Individual, family and group counseling. Culturally-appropriate clinical counseling is a cornerstone of Project PAVE programming— therapists seek to make children, youth and their families whole again after the trauma of relationship violence. Therapists tailor treatment to the needs of each family, offering assessment, counseling, parenting education, family therapy and supportive case management services on a sliding-fee basis to the people we serve. Project PAVE’s licensed clinicians keep abreast of professional techniques such as Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR) and are able to provide services to clients eligible for Victim’s Compensation. Specifically, Project PAVE provides individual, family and group counseling for children and youth who are victims of domestic violence, child abuse and neglect, sexual harassment and abuse, peer or sibling abuse and teen dating violence. Project PAVE also offers a 10 week Healthy Relationship Counseling groups for teens at-risk of, or already impacted by, teen dating violence.
Project PAVE – Janus Foundation Scholarship
Each year Project PAVE’s hosts a fundraiser to support our anti-violence efforts with children, youth and families. Through a decade-long partnership with the Janus Foundation, Project PAVE awards college scholarships to outstanding teens who found the strength to thrive despite living in violent and abusive situations.
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Although domestic violence, teen dating violence and child abuse are found in all communities, Project PAVE focuses its resources on underserved populations. We work primarily with low-income families and provide bilingual/bicultural services to the Hispanic community.
