Cascade

PRACTICUM BACKGROUND

After three years of chipping away at a graduate degree from the Center for Peacebuilding and Justice (CJP), I found myself uncertain of how I wanted to focus my time during the practicum portion of the program. Then in January of 2019, I came across this article and knew I wanted to be involved in some facet of the project. Being able to take a decade of experience working directly with those experiencing sexual harm and pairing it with what I was learning at CJP to help create a practical, accessible resource felt like a perfect fit for my interests and skillset.

PRACTICUM OVERVIEW

The majority of my time was spent working closely with Carolyn Stauffer, Joy Kreider, Rachel Roth Sawatzky, and Ram Bhagat over the course of a year to develop the Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR) for Sexual Harms curriculum. As a team, we wrote the five day curriculum, building on the STAR framework to address sexual harms specifically. I then designed the 165 page training manual.

Additional practicum hours were completed at the Collins Center, where I am currently employed. There was some overlap with my STAR work, specifically in looking into resources for trauma exposure and restorative approaches to sexual harms. These topics were shared with the Collins Center team to further knowledge and potentially inform future programming or collaborations.      

VIRTUAL CAPSTONE - ARTIST STATEMENT

I chose to share my learnings and experiences during my practicum through the medium I know best – the visual arts. The STAR for Sexual Harms curriculum is centered on what we call the Cascade Model, drawing much imagery from the cyclical nature and ever-changing pattern of waves. The curriculum highlights five distinct needs that arise following incidents of sexual harm: Safety, Dignity, Attachment, Structure, and Justice. These themes also serve as the titles for the five chapters, guiding readers through the content.

After spending months working on the graphic design of the manual, I decided to use a mixed media approach to portray the five chapters. The five images together depict an overhead view of a breaking wave. I chose this representation to align with the broad perspective taken in the curriculum. The crest of the wave in each painting is created with a different material illustrative of the themes.

VIEW THE EXHIBIT

VIEW THE CURRICULUM

Click here or on the image below to view and read the curriculum online.

THEORIES OF CHANGE

If individuals who have experienced sexual trauma and those who endure secondary trauma due to their work with this population are provided with a framework to better understand and work through the effects of trauma on their whole being, then they will be able to access tools and resources to engage their experiences in a healthy manner moving forward.

Based on my personal experience of learning more about the effects of primary and secondary trauma in my own life, I believe this theory of change is valid. The more I learn about how my body, mind, and spirit respond to traumatic events or exposure to the experiences of others, the better I am able to care for myself and access resources to support my own healing journey. I have found this to be true over the course of many years of training, reading, counseling, and other contemplative practices. Because we have not had the opportunity to pilot any portion of the STAR for Sexual Harms curriculum, it is difficult to know if the theory will be valid in this context. However, we definitely had this theory of change in mind when writing the manual and our hope was to provide a framework for better understanding, healing, and healthy processing.

If STAR for Sexual Harms brings diverse groups together in community to participate in a learning environment regarding the topic of sexual violence, then participants will be empowered to educate and push for a cultural shift within their spheres of influence.

This theory has not been truly tested, as the STAR for Sexual Harms curriculum has not had the opportunity to be utilized at this point. However, I believe learning together and from one another within diverse groups is the only way change and cultural shift ever has the potential to happen. I believe the best hope we ever have for change is for individuals to continue to be lifelong learners and share knowledge with those around them. Sharing new insights has the power to disrupt current thought patterns and create new ways of seeing and responding to the world. This is something I have experienced firsthand through my experience at CJP. I find myself to be much more aware now when I am witnessing microaggressions and I feel compelled to act in a way I wasn’t as comfortable doing before. I am also more in tune with the role of intersectionality in the cases I see every day and am quicker to speak up with coworkers and allied partners when some of these aspects are being overlooked or minimized.

If dignity is honored throughout procedures that seek to hold individuals who have caused harm accountable, then the needs of all will be addressed, recidivism is likely to decrease, and there will eventually be a shift in the justice opportunities granted to victims who have experienced sexual harm.

I absolutely believe this theory of change is valid. I have had the unique opportunity during my practicum to participate in two restorative justice processes with individuals who have experienced sexual harm. I have been working directly with the harmed individuals in these cases in an advocate role and have attended meetings with the RJ facilitators as the processes move forward. Being in the advocacy role for the harmed party has kept me from participating in conversations with the harm-doer, but the feedback provided by the facilitators during meetings with the harmed parties has been encouraging. Hearing about the meetings with the harm-doer, I have been impressed with the progress they have made in a short amount of time, from barely understanding what they had done that was hurtful to having a much better grasp on the actions and thought processes that led them to harm the other individual.

The way the harm-doer was approached about the RJ opportunity by the facilitators has everything to do with how the process has progressed. I have no doubt that their dignity has been honored throughout this process and they have been allowed a safe space for exploring this experience and how their actions have affected another person. I truly believe after completing this process, they will have a much more thorough understanding of how to uphold better boundaries in their relationships and a more comprehensive view of consent. I believe this individual will go on to have more healthy relationships in the future and am hopeful that they are a low risk for recidivism.

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