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Central Scotland Rape Crisis and Sexual Abuse Centre - Central Scotland Youth Project

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Project: Central Scotland Youth Project

Region: Central Scotland

Amount approved: £5,635

As their name suggests, CSRC & SAC principally exists to meet the multiple needs of those who survive sexual violence, while also delivering training on connected issues to other relevant agencies.

The fact that alcohol is often a factor in, if not an excuse for, such violence comes as no surprise and so drinking to excess already plays an important role in the preventative work they undertake in schools. Broadly speaking, their current school work aims to increase young people’s understanding of violence, its causes and implications, but the ever increasing prominence of alcohol in adult cases has prompted them to enhance their youth delivery on the subject.

Apart from sexual health issues always being a legitimate route to alcohol awareness raising, CSRC & SAC’s approach invariably addresses the facts from an emotional perspective, something Drinkaware actively encourages all applicants to attempt. In this instance, it obviously makes sense to do so given the ever-present theme of violence, but it is particularly appropriate to a primary school audience which will struggle to grasp the long-term health harms which resonate far more with adults or older teenagers.

It also matches Drinkaware’s intention to fund initiatives which look to enhance people’s general life skills around the knowledge they receive, instead of expecting young people to deduce how raw facts are to be used without guidance.

They piloted their specific alcohol sessions in 2010, but now wish to enhance content and evaluate them separately from the rest of their school sessions. Not only does this mean Drinkaware will have supported work which actively combines facts with emotional awareness, but one which has the boldness to tackle the more delicate subject matter with much younger people than most would choose to engage.

Furthermore, some 140 interactive sessions will be delivered on alcohol, embedded in the broader sexual violence activity, each reaching around twenty-five individuals, which represents rare value for money given the small size of the sum awarded.

It is also a subtly different kind of residential model from that employed by Vita Nova: here alcohol sessions are just one of several themes under the violence heading which is covered in the course of a school presence lasting several weeks.

Vita Nova, on the other hand, stick to alcohol and run sessions on five consecutive days. Finding out how well these different residencial models function is essential if Drinkaware is to play a role in discovering the merits of different approaches and the settings in which they should be employed. As ever, we expect the work to be replicable or, at the very least, likely to bring about useful best practice information.

Page last updated by
Unknown, 10 May 2012.
Page checked on
12 Sep 2011
 
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