On my way in to work this morning, a song by Justin Timberlake came on the radio. I’d heard it before, but being stuck in traffic allowed me to pay more attention to the lyrics, and one line in the chorus really stood out to me: “Sometimes the greatest way to say something, is to say nothing at all.” That lyric stayed with me, as I later supported someone who…
Not long ago, I had the pleasure of training a group of collegiate male athletes. Their team, along with other athletic teams at their university, were participating in a day focused on addressing and preventing gender-based violence. As soon as we began our workshop together, it was evident that this was a group of young men who were highly motivated, not only to learn about these…
In her speech at the Golden Globes, Oprah Winfrey spoke of a future where no one would ever have to say #MeToo. With recent conversations about the prevalence of sexual harassment and assault through awareness campaigns like #MeToo, I feel there is a heightened awareness of the need to both teach and model respect in order to eradicate gender-based violence such as sexual assault and domestic…
Last March, my husband and I experienced the biggest surprise of our lives. When I was just under 32 weeks pregnant, our daughter decided she was ready to be born. As a result, the first several weeks of her life were spent in the Brigham and Women’s Newborn Intensive Care Unit (NICU). The care our family received there was out of this world; each day she…
“In a healthy relationship, both individuals’ worlds grow larger. In an unhealthy relationship, one person’s world gets bigger while they use controlling behaviors to make their partner’s world shrink smaller and smaller.” I’ve said some variation of the above statement in countless trainings on domestic violence, and recently it has been at the forefront of my mind. Here at REACH, we’ve been thinking a lot…
This fall, I had an amazing opportunity to give the keynote address at the 5th annual Safe & Healthy School Summit hosted by the Northwestern District Attorney’s office. I would be sharing the stage with some of my heroes, including Attorney General Maura Healey, and speaking to a room of accomplished school professionals. I had a lot of time to think and reflect on my remarks…
This July marks the five year anniversary of Lauren Dunne Astley’s death. Many of you may remember hearing about Lauren’s murder by her ex-boyfriend only a month after they both graduated from Wayland high school. Some of you, like myself, may not have been lucky enough to know Lauren personally. While her death became a national story, Lauren is so much more than how she died….
…And What We Can Do About It Since first reading the victim impact statement written by the survivor of the Stanford Rape Case late on Friday night, I have been inundated with emails, calls, and conversations from friends, family, and colleagues about this story. I have rarely seen a story about sexual assault that doesn’t involve a celebrity capture the attention of the public the way…
April is recognized sexual assault awareness month (SAAM). Some of you may be wondering- what does sexual assault awareness have to do with our work at REACH?
Today, most stories that make the news about college campuses and intimate partner violence are tales of tragedy; stories of students being assaulted by their peers and the additional pain that too many of them experience when campus administrators mishandle their cases if they come forward for help. These stories provide us with powerful narratives of the prevalence of sexual and dating violence on college campuses…
