Virginia Sexual & Domestic Violence Action Alliance

Identifying and Recognizing Organizational Habits
2024-10-16 13:00 - 14:30 (America/New_York) | Virtual- Zoom
What: Let’s begin to imagine robust strategies and practices for sustained wellness, connection and power.
For whom: Advocates, preventionists, outreach staff, and agency leadership are all invited to participate. Sexual and domestic violence programs seeking to bring about organizational change will benefit from identifying a diverse team to participate in attending as many sessions as possible.
Why: Promote wellness, resilience, and sustainability within SDVAs and in your community partnerships through building practices that focus on connection, resilience, trauma stewardship, and hope.

Statewide Advocates' Meeting
2024-10-16 14:00 - 15:00 | Virtual- Zoom
The Statewide Hotline/Crisis Response Team would like to offer this space as an ongoing opportunity for folx working on the front lines and on the hotlines providing direct services and support! This is a space with opportunities to meet other advocates across VA, learn more about the Statewide Hotline and Project for Empowerment of Survivors (PES) and to share trends, highlights, events, regional updates, etc. We look forward to seeing you all every other month in 2024 on the 3rd Wednesday from 2-3p.
If you know of other Advocates, Hotline and/or Direct Services staff that could benefit from joining the space, please send their contact information to lwhite@vsdvalliance.org.
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.

Emerging Together Gathering
2024-10-22 09:00 - 12:00 | Hotel 24 South, 24 South Market Street, Staunton, VA, 24401, United States
What: Together, in A.W.E.: Advocate Wellness Experiences in 3-D
For whom: Advocates and leaders in the field of sexual and domestic violence advocacy,
intervention, and prevention.
Why: Advocate Wellness Experiences are:
Time to HONOR the INNER experience of advocates
Space to BE with those who get it
Guidance to RE-CENTER…
So we can show up to this work whole and WELL.
This special edition A.W.E. session is an in-person opportunity to prioritize taking time to check in with ourselves and each other. We will explore wellness topics and skills that you can bring into your own wellness practice and into your work supporting survivors. Together, we will also have time and space to engage in personal reflection and build deeper connections with each other over a community meal.
Breakfast provided

Emergence: From Vision to Practice
2024-10-22 14:00 - 2024-10-23 16:00 | Hotel 24 South, 24 South Market Street, Staunton, VA, 24401, United States
What: An experiential gathering integrating a foundation of wellness and wholeness into organizational life. We will explore robust strategies and move from habits to practices.
For whom: Advocates, preventionists, outreach staff, and agency leadership are all invited to participate. Bring a diverse team from your organization to help your organizational wellness practices stick!
Why: Deepen your organizational foundation of wellness and wholeness through robust strategies and practices. By increasing retention of healthy staff at sexual and domestic violence agencies, we directly improve the emotional and physical safety and well-being of survivors who are in our care.
Breakfast and lunch provided on the 23rd.

Emergence: From Wellness to Impact
2024-10-24 09:00 - 2024-10-25 12:00 | Hotel 24 South, 24 South Market Street, Staunton, VA, 24401, United States
What: Let’s build relationships, expertise, and collective power to position healing-centered communities as catalysts for transformation. We’ll explore your landscapes, relationship maps, and readiness with the goal of having a measurable impact on at least one complex problem facing your community.
What are some examples of a community wellness project?
-Establish once a month free dental/vision/mental health/wellness checks for vulnerable communities at a location that is easy to reach in your community.
-Ask your community’s teens about what kind of activities or help they need outside of school and make a plan to meet one of those goals.
-Establish a pilot program in one middle or high school to implement trauma-informed and restorative responses to school discipline issues.
-Work with community organizers and partners to launch an affordable/workforce housing campaign.
There are so many possibilities!
For whom: Bring a team! Community Impact Teams are intended to be a collaboration between a sexual and domestic violence agency (SDVA) and 1-2 other community partners. In selecting community partners, consider how to deepen existing relationships in your work to respond to and prevent violence – for example, consider a partner working to support healthy child development, reduce maternal mortality, or create greater access to community resources that will ultimately lead to thriving families and communities.
Why: This is an opportunity for sexual and domestic violence advocates to learn, organize, and meaningfully implement with community partners who have shared visions for wellness.
Breakfast and lunch provided on the 24th. Breakfast provided on the 25th.
Please note: The Action Alliance will cover the cost of 1 night lodging for each registrant of this event.

VAdata Training and Virtual Office Hours
2024-10-29 15:00 - 16:30, 2024-11-26 15:00 - 16:30 | Virtual- Zoom

Embracing Primary Prevention: Communities and Institutions
2024-10-30 10:00 - 16:00 | Training Center, 1413 W. Main St., Richmond, VA, 23220
One way we describe an integral practice in primary prevention is to water your roots deep. Which means that the prevention work you do should exist deeply in the places that you would like to make the greatest impact. For this training we will be discussing how to weave primary prevention into your community and the institutions that make this work possible. We will examine ways to sprinkle primary prevention throughout your agency and make connections with the institutions you would like to work closely with. This training is intended for prevention staff, agency leadership, and community partners.
Upon completing this training, participants will be able to:
-Formulate a shared vision and develop a strategic plan for their agency’s prevention efforts with their colleagues (leadership and/or grant writers).
-Discuss the common goals they share with preventionists from other agencies for ending sexual and domestic violence across the state.
-Describe effective prevention programming and describe a vision of community-level prevention for their agency.
-Understand how to apply strategies from the 2nd primary prevention guideline in “Fostering Community Resilience” titled “Institutionalized in Organizational Culture.”
-Use tools and models they received to support their efforts of institutionalizing prevention into their organization.

Annual Membership Meeting
2024-10-30 13:00 - 14:30 | Virtual- Zoom
We will host our Annual Action Alliance Business Membership Meeting virtually on Wednesday, October 30, 2024, from 1-2:30 pm. For the Zoom link, please reach out to Leisha Santilli @ lsantilli@vsdvalliance.org

I Emerge: Wellness Coaching/Individual TA
2024-11-01 09:00 - 17:00, 2024-12-01 09:00 - 17:00 | Virtual- Zoom
For Whom: Advocates and leaders in the field of sexual and domestic violence advocacy, intervention, and prevention
Why: Dedicated time and space to fit your schedule, as well as your wellness-related intentions and barriers. This 45-minute one-on-one coaching supports your exploration of how to be connected, well, and whole in this work – from the inside-out.
Click the link to schedule your monthly coaching session.

We Emerge: Coaching Session
2024-11-06 10:00 - 11:00, 2024-12-04 10:00 - 11:00 | Virtual- Zoom
What: A.W.E. Group Sessions (Advocate Wellness Experiences)
Why: Advocate Wellness Experience Sessions are:
● Time to HONOR the INNER experience of advocates
● Space to BE with those who get it
● Guidance to RE-CENTER…
● So can we show up to this work whole, and WELL.
Drop into these monthly sessions to prioritize taking time to check in with ourselves and each other. Explore wellness topics and skills that you can bring into your own wellness practice and into your work supporting survivors.
Sessions will be held on the first Wednesday of September, November, and December at 10am. Join one or all of the sessions.

Basic Advocacy Trainings- DV & SV
2024-11-12 08:00 - 2024-11-13 17:00 | SSRC, 22 East Church St, Suite 307, Martinsville, VA, 24112
DV BAT: This training is designed for advocates in their first year of work in the field of Domestic Violence Advocacy. Participants will be able to identify and define domestic and intimate partner violence; learn the building blocks for a trauma informed response and broaden their understanding of risk assessment and safety planning. Participants will also learn about resources in VA for supporting survivors of domestic and intimate partner violence.
SV BAT: This training is designed for advocates in their first year of work in the field of Sexual Violence Advocacy. Participants will learn how to recognize sexual violence, it’s root causes and its impact on individuals and communities; they will learn about the Cultural Context that supports sexual violence and an advocate’s role in changing that culture. Participants will also learn about the building blocks for a healing centered approach to sexual violence and be able to identify resources in Virginia for an effective response.
*It is highly recommended that new advocates receive both DV and SV Basic Advocacy Training.

People of Color Caucus
2024-11-12 15:30 - 17:30 | Virtual
The People of Color Caucus was formed to create a space where folks of color can come together to be in community and foster connections and have connections on how to amplify each others voices. Caucuses are for Action Alliance members only.
In 2024, we have a lot of opportunities to meet and we hope to see you for one of them.
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.

Navigating Social Impact
2024-11-13 13:00 - 14:30 | Virtual- Zoom

Emergence: Impact Teams Navigating Social Conditions and Events on Your Transformational Journey
2024-11-14 13:00 - 14:30 | Virtual- Zoom
What: An experiential gathering integrating a foundation of wellness and wholeness into life. We will explore robust strategies and move from habits to practices.
For whom: Advocates, preventionists, outreach staff, and agency leadership are all invited to participate. Bring a diverse team from your organization to help your organizational wellness practices stick!
Why: Deepening the organizational foundation of wellness and wholeness through robust strategies and practices. By increasing retention of healthy staff at sexual and domestic violence agencies, we directly improve the emotional and physical safety and well-being of survivors who are in our care.

State and Local Partners Meeting
2024-11-14 13:00 - 16:00 | Virtual- Zoom
These quarterly gatherings of advocates, preventionists, sexual and domestic violence agency administrators, state funders and other partners serving survivors of violence are opportunities for connection and collaboration on the local, regional, and state level. The State and Local Partners Meetings are a unique opportunity for agencies to share their expertise and experiences from the front lines with funding partners who would like to learn more about emerging trends, needs, and celebrations among our communities.
This year, we will be moving the focus to our collective work across the Commonwealth. Increasingly, survivors and advocates often face many of the same issues (such as affordable housing, transportation, child care, substance use, mental illness, and lack of community resources) regardless of their location within Virginia. We want to provide a better opportunity for networking, peer-to-peer connection, and a space to crowd-source ideas, resources, and promising practices. Our first three meetings will be virtual, and the last meeting of the year will be an in-person opportunity for professional development, resource sharing, and networking.
This invitation is open to advocates, preventionists, funders, and other partners serving survivors and/or supporting community education on healthy relationships. Our time together will be spent learning from each other, engaging in discussion on statewide issues, sharing valuable resources, etc. We anticipate that participants who join the meetings are coming prepared to engage in conversations that will continue to move forward the work of ending sexual and domestic violence here in the Commonwealth.

Virginia Restoryation Report Q&A
2024-11-18 11:00 - 12:00 | Virtual- Zoom
Virginia was one of 25 states and territories across the U.S. to participate in Restoryation, a national storytelling project and needs assessment among professionals working in the movement to end sexual and domestic violence.

Restoryation not only offered time to pause and reflect on the impact of the previous 3 years on ourselves and our work, but also to name what is needed to create a thriving workforce and movement going forward. So what is needed to do that?

Now that you’ve had a chance to look over the Restoryation findings, join us for a drop-in Q&A session about the findings and the Action Alliance’s next steps based on the lessons we learned.

Principles of Primary Prevention
2024-11-21 09:00 - 16:00 | Training Center, 1413 W. Main St., Richmond, VA, 23220
Primary prevention programs are focused on reducing or eliminating the first-time perpetration of sexual violence and intimate partner violence (SV/IPV). This means figuring out what factors make some people more at-risk to perpetrate SV/IPV, and changing or interrupting those factors. This training delves into the key concepts underlying this innovative work, highlights promising practices from the field, and includes an overview of Virginia’s Guidelines for the Primary Prevention of Sexual Violence & Intimate Partner Violence used by sexual and domestic violence agencies throughout Virginia and across the country.
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.

Director’s Virtual Meet-up
2024-12-04 14:00 - 15:00 | Virtual- Zoom
The Statewide Hotline/Crisis Response Team would like to offer this space as an ongoing opportunity to increase partnership, learn more about the needs at agencies, have a place to share and learn more about Statewide Hotline operations, and to provide the space for folx to discuss challenges, highlights, regional updates, trends, etc. We look forward to seeing you all every other month in 2024 (February, April, June, August, October and December) on the 1st Monday from 2-3p!
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.

VaData Training
2024-12-06 10:00 - 14:00 | Training Center, 1413 W. Main St., Richmond, VA, 23220
Sexual and domestic violence agencies across the state are using VAdata to track services and manage their grant reporting. For new staff, this means learning about VAdata, how data is captured, and how to use data to tell the story of survivors in your area. For advanced users, the training aims to provide participants with information about the many reports available in VAdata and hands on experience inputting data. After these trainings, participants will understand more about the history and scope of the VAdata system, how to use and audit queries to retrieve information, how to use reports in grant writing, raising community awareness and more, and how data entry practices impact data and reporting statewide.
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.

New Directors' Series 2024: Heading Out to Sea
2024-12-09 10:00 - 15:00 | Training Center, 1413 W. Main St., Richmond, VA, 23220
A successful voyage requires not only balance, provisions, and an effective crew, but also successful navigation. Directors play key roles in communicating a vision and setting the course from day to day. Explore options for approaching strategic planning as well as course corrections in agency mission and goals. Leave with resources that will help you in your role as a navigator.
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.

Basic Advocacy Trainings- DV & SV
2024-12-10 09:00 - 2024-12-11 17:00 | The Loft, 76 W Gay Street, Harrisonburg, VA, 22802

Statewide Advocates' Meeting
2024-12-18 14:00 - 15:00

I-CAN ECHO: Best Practices Accessible Communication
2025-01-08 12:00 - 13:30 | Virtual
Extension for Community Health Outcomes or ECHO is a virtual network. Our ECHO will provide professionals with opportunities to learn about supporting survivors of abuse with disabilities and connect with other professionals.
Our ECHO will be held once a month on Wednesdays from 12:00-1:30 PM. Certificates of participation and CEUs are available.

November 13: Disability Etiquette & Respect
December 11: Supporting Survivors who are d/Deaf or Hard of Hearing
January 15: Best Practices Accessible Communication
February 12: Disabilities and the Criminal Justice System
March 12 Brain Injury and Abuse
April 23: Hot Topic

Violence Prevention in Action ECHO
2025-01-15 10:30 - 12:00 | Virtual- Zoom
Join our Violence Prevention in Action ECHO program to build your prevention network, connect over challenging cases, and stay on top of best practices in sexual and intimate partner violence primary prevention!
Project ECHO is an international, evidence-based model for training and peer-to-peer learning, originally developed at the University of New Mexico for use by doctors and other medical providers. We’ve used the model since 2019 to cultivate a thriving community of preventionists from Sexual and Domestic Violence Agencies across the Commonwealth.
For more information about our use of the ECHO model or the structure of the session, please visit: https://bit.ly/VPAecho.

2025 Day of Action
2025-01-29 14:00 - 2025-01-30 12:00 | The Women’s Club at the Bolling Haxall House, 211 E. Franklin Street, Richmond, VA, 23220, United States
Calling all advocates from Virginia’s sexual and domestic violence agencies! Join us for our annual DAY OF ACTION in Richmond! We need your voice now more than ever!
Local agencies providing life-saving services for victims of sexual assault, domestic violence, stalking, and trafficking are facing a financial crisis like we’ve never seen. Drastic and ongoing cuts to the federal Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) program has resulted in a $22.5 million dollar reduction in awards to Virginia in just the last 5 years (federal fiscal years 2020-2024). The portion of these funds that go to Virginia’s 70+ sexual and domestic violence agencies, to ensure frontline, 24/7 crisis response to victims in communities, has been cut by a whopping 54%, or $13.5 million dollars, in the last 5 years alone (state fiscal years 2020-2025).
As a result of these ongoing and devastating cuts, the community safety-net for victims is rapidly eroding. But we can turn this around. Virginia must continue to PUT VICTIMS FIRST.
In 2025, the Virginia Sexual and Domestic Violence Action Alliance is asking policy leaders for $8.25 million in state funding that, when combined with current state funds and projected VOCA funds, will restore Virginia to a total of $27.75M/year for sexual and domestic violence services.
Join us on January 29th and January 30th as we rally for sustainable, robust, and effective responses for victims in our communities! Please see our schedule of events below:
Wednesday January 29th
The Women’s Club at the Bolling Haxall House
211 E. Franklin Street
Richmond, VA 23220
Parking lot on-site with overflow street parking
2pm Registration
2:30pm Welcome
2:45pm Legislative Advocacy Primer
3:30pm Break
3:45pm Briefing on 2025 Legislative Priorities and talking points
4:30pm Legislative meeting practice runs
5pm Happy hour reception for advocates, with special guests!
6pm Check into hotels, get dinner in town, and get a good night’s sleep!
Thursday January 30th
General Assembly Building
201 N. 9th Street
Richmond, VA 23219
7am – Noon Legislative visits (made in advance with your legislator)
*Action Alliance staff available throughout the day on 1st floor of General Assembly Building in Cafeteria

VaData Training
2025-01-31 10:00 - 14:00 | Charlottesville, VA
Sexual and domestic violence agencies across the state use VAdata to track services and manage their grant reporting. For new staff, this means there’s a lot to learn about VAdata, how data is captured, and how to use data to tell the story of survivors in your area. For advanced users, there may be more questions about the many reports available or specific questions about how data shows up in those reports.
After this training, participants will understand more about the history and scope of the VAdata system, how to use and audit queries to retrieve information, how to use reports in grant writing, raising community awareness and more, and how data entry practices impact data and reporting statewide. Participants are encouraged to bring any and all questions to the training along with their laptops to apply practical tips learned to their own agency’s VAdata account.
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.

Directors' Virtual Meet Up
2025-02-05 14:00 - 15:00 | Virtual- Zoom
The Statewide Hotline/Crisis Response Team would like to offer this space as an ongoing opportunity to increase partnership, learn more about the needs at agencies, have a place to share and learn more about Statewide Hotline operations, and to provide the space for folx to discuss challenges, highlights, regional updates, trends, etc. We look forward to seeing you all every other month in 2025 (February, April, June, August, October and December) on the 1st Wednesday from 2-3p!
Note: We will try to accommodate last minute language translation requests but we typically need two weeks to secure interpretation services.
