The Alliance for Community Transformations in Mariposa had a busy and productive first year of the DELTA FOCUS project.  In keeping with the core components of the project, the Alliance has focused on Evaluation, Informing Policy, Communications, and Partnership Building. Year 1 was a great start on all of these components, and we’re all looking forward to continuing to build on this work for the current and upcoming years of the project.

Here are the highlights of their work so far:

Evaluation

• Completed an evaluability assessment which describes the project design including project goals and impacts; theory of change; strategies; inputs and outputs; outcomes; and describes some of the factors that will shape the project’s implementation.
• Completed an evaluation plan which addresses specific aspects of the evaluation process such as data collection methods and the frequency and timing under which it will occur; key questions; data management and analysis tasks; and steps for reporting.
• Developed a number of evaluation tools that will help us gather data related to our project objectives: strategic communications; policy analysis and development; and partnership building and community mobilization.
• Implemented the evaluations tools and collected baseline data.

Informing Policy

• Researched and analyzed current policies, protocols, and procedures in order to develop policy analysis and education resources.
• Identified areas in current school and district policy that have intersections with preventing dating abuse.
• Conducted trainings with the Adolescent Dating Abuse Sub-Committee of the Mariposa Abuse Prevention Collaborative (MAPC) addressing the Social-Ecological Model and the importance of policy in prevention efforts.

Communications

• Attended a public narratives training in St. Paul, Minnesota, which helped us to begin the process of translating values into action and understand how we will be creating new narratives around Dating Abuse.
• Identified and promoted new narratives, frames, and messages around the issue of dating abuse that include:
  • An emphasis on ways that young people can create and maintain healthy relationships
  • A shift in the terminology from teen dating violence to adolescent relationship abuse
  • Using policy as a method of prevention
• Pinpointed four audiences for whom new narratives, frames, and messages will be delivered: champions and partners in the education system; school district employees; parents and other caregivers; youth; and community partners.

Partnership-Building

• Organized a dating abuse sub-committee that includes partners from important community organizations: public health, Sherriff’s department, youth center, school district, and health and human services.
• Provided training to the sub-committee that focused on institutionalizing primary prevention principles, concepts, and practices, and explained the ways in which the DELTA FOCUS project aims to prevent dating abuse and intimate partner violence on community and societal levels.

Community Mobilization

• Garnered support and buy-in for the project from partners and potential champions through in-person meetings, project briefings, and informal discussions.
• Created a prevention plan and a prevention sustainability plan that, with help from our sub-committee, will aid us in institutionalizing prevention within our community.
• Recognized areas in our community where prevention is already institutionalized and highlighted areas where more institutionalization is needed.