The Community Education and Outreach Program educates the Midlands community about sexual violence. We strive to decrease the stigma surrounding this issue, increase survivor’s ability to access resources and seek help, and prevent/eliminate sexual violence in our community. Since 1997, STSM’s Education Program has been collaborating with schools, churches, government and nonprofit agencies, businesses, and other entities to provide trainings and workshops across the state of South Carolina.
Every 2 minutes, someone in America is sexually assaulted (RAINN). Sexual Violence affects every segment of society. To address the stigma of this kind of assault on our community, prevent further occurrences of victimization, and increase access to our services, STSM has developed a variety of trainings for adults and professionals in businesses and the community.
Stewards of Children
Adults Resolving Child Sexual Abuse in Community
Darkness to Light’s® Stewards of Children is a revolutionary sexual abuse prevention training program that educates adults to prevent, recognize, and react responsibly to child sexual abuse. The program believes and teaches that child safety is an adult's job. Stewards of Children is designed for organizations that serve children and youth.
What are the distinctive features of Stewards of Children?
How can it be used?
Stewards of Children Works!
How do I schedule or register for a training?
Sexual Trauma Services of the Midlands schedules trainings in two ways. We work directly with churches, youth-serving organizations, sports leagues and other groups to provide trainings for their staff, volunteers, and parents. Contact the Community Education Director at STSM via email or call 803-790-8208 x124 to discuss training dates and requirements.
STSM also has trainings that are often scheduled throughout the year and are open to the public. Check out our events section of this website for trainings that are currently scheduled in your community. Click here to register for an upcoming training, or contact the Community Education Director at STSM via email or call 803-790-8208 x 124 to receive a registration form.
Salon professions are in a unique situation where they work intimately with men and women in a comfortable environment where intimacy and trust are often built over time. Many victims of sexual and domestic violence outright disclose their abuse to their hair dresser. Other times salon workers notice signs of abuse on their customers, signs such as bruising or cuts, but do not recognize these signs for what they are. Cut It Out, is a unique training offered to salon professionals to help them recognize signs of abuse in their clients and inform them of where to safely refer victims for help.
Contact the Community Education Director at STSM via email or call 803-790-8208 x124 to discuss training dates and requirements.
Studies indicate that one in five youth experience a sexual solicitation online. More and more cases are coming forward of youth sending inappropriate pictures and private information across text messages or social media networks. This training teaches adults and parents how to apply key safety principals across all internet-enabled platforms used by children and youth.
Contact the Community Education Director at STSM via email or call 803-790-8208 x124 to discuss training dates and requirements.
Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Training
This 3.5 hour training will teach adults to prevent, recognize, and react to situations of child sexual abuse. This is a prefect training for parents/guardians, adults who work with youth, staff in child care centers, and other organizations that work with children and youth. Click here for more information about this program.
Healthy Sexuality and the Normalization of Sexual Harm
Popular culture is saturated with images of violence, especially sexual violence perpetrated on women and girls. With the help of research by two prominent professionals in the sexual violence field, Cordelia Anderson from Sensibilities, Inc. in Minnesota and Brad Perry from Virginia's Sexual and Domestic Violence Action Alliance, this workshop explores stereotypes in society and how they may contribute to violence, especially for women and girls. Emphasis will be placed on the images of sexual harm in popular media and how they affect society and the concepts of "healthy sexuality."
Mandated Reporting
The STSM Mandated Reporter Training is perfect for businesses, schools and organizations that work with youth. This training includes an overview of South Carolina mandated reporting law, situations that constitute making a report, where and when to make a report, and resources in our community.
Sexual Assault 101
This workshop is an overview of the key concepts related to the topic of sexual assault. Participants will be introduced to the idea of consent, the Criminal Sexual Assault laws in SC, the statistics related to sexual assault and rape, the effects of this type of trauma on survivors.
Sexual Harassment in the Workplace
Despite it being illegal, sexual harassment in the workplace is a reality for all-too many working individuals. In one survey, 9 out of 10 women under 50 who served in the US military reported being SH while in the service. Another study found that 83% of girls and 79% of boys in High School report having ever experienced harassment. In 2003, 19% of employees reported being harassed in the past 12 months. In 2007, the US Equal Employment and Opportunity Commission received 12,510 charges of sexual harassment. 16.0% of those charges were filed by males. This number has been rising for the past few years.
This training defines what actions are sexual harassment; explores federal and SC state laws & the impact of harassment on the victim, the acused, and the organization/office; and details how to recognize, prevent, and report sexual harassment in the office.
Teen Dating Violence
Research shows that physical or sexual abuse is a part of 1 in 3 high school relationships. And one in every four women experiences domestic violence in her lifetime. This training discusses healthy versus unhealthy relationships and serves as an overview of intimate partner violence and its effects on victims (adult and youth). The workshop introduces audience to early warning signs of abuse and ways to reduce risks in relationships, as well as increases understanding of what to do to prevent relationship violence and what to do in the event that someone you know is in an abusive relationship.
Contact the Community Education Director at STSM via email or call 803-790-8208 x124 to schedule a training or to discuss requirements.
Did you know that one in four girls and one in six boys is sexually abused before the age of 18? Nearly 70% of all reported sexual assaults (including assaults on adults) occur to children ages 17 and under! (Darkness to Light) To prevent further occurrence of sexual violence in our community we must reach out to those who are most at risk, our youth. Therefore, Sexual Trauma Services offers a variety of workshops and programs for children and teens to prevent dating violence and sexual abuse and assault.
One of the most important things we can do to protect children is to talk with them about potentially dangerous situations. This 1 hour program is geared toward children in Kindergarten through 3rd grade. This program starts with the viewing of an Emmy Award-winning DVD which introduces program participants to seven easy-to-remember “Hot Tips” for safety. Following the video, trained instructors from STSM speak with the children about safety and lead fun, interactive discussions to get the youth involved and help them remember what they learned from the video.
To schedule a presentation, email STSM's Community Education Program Director or call STSM at 803-790-8208 x124.
Statistics show that from 1991-2003 more than half of all victims of rape in South Carolina were middle- and high school-aged youth (Against their Will: Sexual Violence in SC, June 2005). Dating violence is also a harsh reality that many youth face.
In response to these and other issues that youth face, STSM developed the Youth Violence Prevention Program (YVPP). This program is for mddle and high school-aged youth. Utilizing the principals of effective prevention programming, this 6 lesson curriculum covers a wide range of topics geared toward reducing risk and preventing sexual and relationship violence. Trained facilitators use interactive activities, videos, songs, discussion, and lectures to teach youth about gender violence in the media, healthy boundary-setting and communication, on-line safety, dating violence, sexual harassment and sexual assault.
Each lesson lasts approximately an hour to 1 ½ hours and lessons are usually scheduled once/week.
Contact STSM's Community Education Director via email or call 803-790-8208 x 124 to schedule a presentation.
| Middle/High School Lesson Title & Topics |
Objectives Determinants |
Activities What activities we might use to engage participants. |
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| Lesson 1: The Effect of Gender Stereotypes & Media Influence on Violence in Relationships |
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| Lesson 2: Appropriate Boundary Setting & Online Victimization & Protection Strategies |
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| Lesson 3: Effective Communication Strategies |
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| Lesson 4: Healthy Relationships and Prevention of Teen Dating Violence |
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| Lesson 5: Prevention of Sexual Harassment & Stalking (HS)/ Prevention of Sexual Harassment & Bullying (MS) |
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| Lesson 6: Prevention of Sexual Assault, SC Laws and Date Rape Drugs (Date Rape Drugs portions for HS only) |
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Each prevention program and education workshop is tailored to meet the needs of the specific community as well as the ages of the participants. Click on the link below to view examples of presentations on the topics of Healthy Relationships and the Prevention of Teen Dating Violence for middle school youth and the Prevention of Sexual Assault and Date Rape Drugs for high school youth.
To schedule a presentation contact STSM's Community Education Program Director via email or call 803-790-8208 x124.
| Attachment | Size |
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| STSM Sample Presentations | 48.94 KB |
Your presentations helped our students gain a better understanding of gender stereotypes, and the influence of media, boundary setting, interpersonal communication, sexual harassment, sexual assault and healthy relationships. Your delivery of obscure and challenging topics was masterful. The students’ level of participation during discussions and the caliber of their comments and questions were indicators of your ability to create a place where the students felt safe to carry on meaningful conversations. It was enjoyable for me to watch you teach and watch the children learn.
- Guidance Counselor from a private Middle School
The STS representatives have been very professional. STS complies with mandates of the Comprehensive Health Education Act as well as district/school policies. Evaluations by students have documents that STS educators work extremely well with this population and that they find the presentations entertaining yet serious and valuable….In fact, because of one of [the] presentations in the spring, a student reported an adult working with teens that had violated one of the laws pertaining to criminal sexual conduct. He was immediately removed from the workplace, investigated, and admitted guilt. Had [STSM] not given the presentation, it is likely this first time offender would have continued to exploit this teen and other young people.
- Educator at a public High School
I want to thank you for sharing your expertise with our clients. So many of them have sexual trauma in their histories and need to work through so many issues. I know just hearing the information you gave them will help them begin to talk about things. Thanks again.
- Employee at a Substance Abuse Facility
Thank you very much for the wonderful training you provided to us regarding Sexual Harassment in the Workplace. It was most insightful and quite valuable. We appreciate your willingness to come and share with us. Again, THANKS!
- Director at a business in Columbia
Thank you for once again presenting to our … class on such an important topic. You do a great job presenting the info in ways that keep their attention and spark discussion. I also appreciate you researching and sending me info that answered some of their more obscure questions. Hope to have you again next year!.
- College Professor
Thank you for coming here and teaching us about boundaries, relationships, and just things to help us. I really liked you teaching that and it helped me! Class was real fun because we were actually doing things that related to what I was going through at the time!!
- High School Student who attended the Youth Violence Prevention Program
I enjoyed this training session, and I highly recommend this program to any adult.
- Adult professional who attended the Stewards of Children Training
This lesson is very helpful for people to learn to be more responsible and fair in friendships, your home, schools and romantic affairs.
- High School Student who attended the Gender Stereotypes/Media Influences Session in the Youth Violence Prevention Program
I work in a public school. Is it legal for you to talk about these topics to kids in my school?
Yes, everything we discuss follows the law. Our curriculum adheres to the Comprehensive Sex Education Act for our state and we have the approval of each school district to be working with the schools. In fact, our youth program covers topics that are required by the SC Health and Safety Education Standards to be taught in schools. So schools should be covering this material anyway!
I don’t have time to have you cover all topics. Can you just present one or two topics?
Our preference is to cover all six topics. We know that change is not going to be made in just one session. Additionally, the curriculum builds on itself as we continue from week to week. So students will miss out on a lot of information if we do not facilitate each lesson. However, we recognize that time is an issue for most schools and youth-serving organizations. Therefore, we are flexible. If you absolutely cannot accommodate all six sessions, we will work with your organization to find which lessons are right for you. In some, rare cases, we can combines lessons into one session.
Do you need parent permission forms?
No. As an organization, we do not require parent permission forms. It is our understanding that as we partner with organizations or schools, they are in contact with parents and are keeping parents abreast of the activities their child is participating in while at their program. We do not require parent permission forms because if a child is being abused at home, the parents/guardians will certainly not allow the child to attend our lessons. We do not want to exclude anyone from our lessons, most especially those children who need our help the most.
Do you have any other topics that you cover other than the sessions listed in the Youth Violence Prevention Program?
The sessions in the YVPP are the topics that we most often cover. However, we will work with organizations if they are interested in other topics. In the past we have facilitated workshops on Healthy Sexuality, The Normalization of Harm in our Culture, the Impact of Crime, etc.
Do you evaluate your program?
Yes, we evaluate the Youth Violence Prevention Program. We currently conduct pre and post tests to determine change in attitude, knowledge and behavior. This is the first year we are conducting this rigorous of an evaluation so we do not have any measurable data at this time.
How do I schedule a presentation?
Click here to send an email to the Community Education Program Director or call the STSM office at 803-790-8208 x124.
Clothesline Project - Click the link to the left to view pictures of last year's Clothesline Project.
Throughout the month of April, survivors and significant others are invited to express their thoughts and feelings through artwork. The art projects will include T-shirts and jeans, which will be displayed at various locations throughout the month of April. White is for Murder or death as a result of violence. Yellow, Brown, or Beige is for assault or battery. Pink, Red, or Orange is for rape of sexual assault. Green or Blue is for child sexual assault or incest. Purple or lavender is for homophobic violence. Black is for gang rape. Jeans are for misconceptions and injustice surrounding rape. Please donate old jeans, t-shirts, and arts/crafts to make the clothesline project possible. The agency accepts donations between 9 am and 5 pm Monday through Friday at the office located at 3700 Forest Drive, Suite 350 or contact us to arrange pick up.
Walk a Mile in Her Shoes - Click the link to the left for more information about this year's event.
Walk a Mile in Her Shoes © provides a great opportunity for men to get involved in the fight against sexual violence and in educating the community. Walk a Mile in Her Shoes © asks men to literally walk one mile in women's high-heeled shoes to rally the community to fight against sexual violence. STSM’s goal is to help men understand and appreciate women’s experiences, and realize that this is not only a women’s issue. This is also an opportunity for the community to become aware of services provided for those survivors of sexual assault.
Denim Day - Click the link to the left for more information about this year's event.
In Italy in 1992, an 18 year old girl was forcefully raped by her 45 year old driving instructor. The assailant was arrested, convicted, and sentenced to jail. He appealed the sentence, and the case made its way to the Italian Supreme Court. The Supreme Court released the perpetrator and dismissed all charges. The reasoning behind this was “because the victim wore very, very tight jeans, she had to help him remove them, and by removing the jeans it was no longer rape but consensual sex.” The women in the Italian Parliament wore jeans in protest, and the California Senate and Assembly did the same. Thus, Denim Day was born.
Please wear jeans to raise awareness and educate the public about rape and sexual assault!
Community Partner Appreciation - Click the link to the left for more information about this year's event.
STSM annually shows our appreciation to all organizations, agencies and individuals who partner with STSM on a daily basis to provide education and the best services possible to survivors of sexual assault and abuse throughout the Midlands area. The celebration is an opportunity to meet our staff, volunteers and other partners in the community, enjoy hors devours and refreshments, and celebrate our accomplishments. The winners of the Community Partner Appreciation Awards will be announced during this event.
Tee It Up for STSM Golf Tournament - Click the link to the left for more information about this year's event.
Approximately 220 golfers from across the country enjoy 18 holes of 4 person Captain’s Choice during this annual fundraising event. Team prizes are given, including prizes for Longest Drive and Closest to the Pin on all par-3 holes. Lunch, dinner, and beverages are provided.
Rape Aggression Defense Training (RAD) - Click on link to the left for more information about this year's event
The Richland County Sheriff’s Department will facilitate this women’s self defense course to teen girls and their mothers/guardians. The course is specifically for teen girls age 15-18 (14 year olds permitted with parent/guardian participation). Mothers are encouraged to participate with their daughters, but it is not required. This is a crime prevention program that utilizes techniques that are specifically designed for women to reduce the likelihood of victimization. This program empowers women to recognize their strengths and make sound decisions when faced with potentially dangerous situations.