An NRCDV project since 1995, VAWnet is funded through continuing grants from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (National Center on Injury Prevention and Control). VAWnet is a full-text, searchable electronic document repository containing a comprehensive collection of materials and resources organized to assist in the design and implementation of effective intervention and prevention initiatives addressing domestic and sexual violence. VAWnet includes two subsites developed to provide guidance, public education resources, and support for Domestic Violence Awareness Month (DVAM) and Sexual Assault Awareness Month (SAAM) activities.
Through VAWnet´s Applied Research Forum, researchers and practitioners are commissioned to prepare brief summaries and interpretations of current research on violence against women. The National Sexual Violence Resource Center (NSVRC) serves as the NRCDV´s key partner and provides critical guidance regarding the sexual violence information and resources provided through VAWnet. In 2007, VAWnet receives over 2,000 visitors a day and these visitors download over 1,900 files daily. A significant number of the most frequently downloaded documents are those produced by NRCDV staff and consultants. Documenting Our Work Project Following discussions among state coalition directors, women of color activists, and others about the need for carefully developed tools that domestic violence advocates could use to document their work on behalf of survivors, the NRCDV launched the multi-phased Documenting Our Work Project (DOW). Guided by focus groups representing historically underserved victims older women, individuals with disabilities, women of color, battered immigrant women, and teens experiencing dating violence and information gathered from the Women of Color Network, the HHS-funded culturally-specific Institutes, and other national domestic violence groups, DOW consultants designed and pilot tested a set of documentation and self-assessment instruments for use by local domestic violence programs and state coalitions. These instruments and guidance related to their use will be disseminated electronically and via other means to domestic violence programs around the country during the last quarter of this year. Since 2006, these DOW instruments and the NRCDV have played a central role in the multi-year initiative spearheaded by the Division of Family Violence to enhance FVPSA data collection and outcome measurement by grantees. Building Comprehensive Services to Domestic Violence (BCS) Project Initiated in 1998 under a 4-year, $1 million grant from The Ford Foundation, and continued under the NRCDVs core HHS grant, the primary goals of this project has been two-fold: to identify and enhance the skills and resources needed by domestic violence advocates to forge, strengthen and maintain effective, multi-disciplinary collaborations among domestic violence organizations, community agencies, and institutions committed to ending domestic violence; and to develop a more comprehensive public policy analysis and unified advocacy agenda in key policy and program areas. In practical terms, a BCS approach encompasses:
- Visions, policies, and practices that respond to the daily realities facing survivors and their families, especially those living in poverty;
- Effective collaboration; and
- A woman-defined advocacy approach that respectfully connects women from different cultures and experiences to resources relevant to their needs.
BCS has made use of national consultants to review and critique public policy affecting domestic violence victims, develop an extensive set of policy, practice and vision papers (19 to date), and other tools to assist domestic violence victims in their collective advocacy work. NRCDV also publishes a BCS newsletter as a vehicle to profile promising practices and BCS approaches. In late 2007, a BCS Leaders Guide will be published, developed to assist both long-term and emerging leaders in the domestic violence field by providing practical information about how to sustain and grow a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing comprehensive solutions advocacy.
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