Comunidades Latinas Unidas en Servicio(CLUES): Minneapolis
Latinx Community: Change in Cultural Norms, Behaviors, and Attitudes Regarding Sexual Violence & Healthy Relationships
In Minneapolis, Comunidades Latinas Unidas en Servicio(CLUES), is working on educating Latinx teens and parents on sexual violence and healthy relationships in order to change cultural norms, behaviors, and attitudes; teens at El Colegio and their parents are taught through a culturally specific curriculum; recommendations to El Colegio on changes to practices and policies in order to provide better support to teens in unhealthy relationships and handling sexual violence.
Organization's Mission Statement
To bring the Latinx community united in understanding, educating, and preventing on the impact cultural norms, behaviors, and attitudes have on sexual violence and relationships.
Lessons Learned
- Latinx teens understand the concepts regarding sexual violence and healthy vs. unhealthy relationships yet, they continue to model same normative behaviors that are unhealthy.
- Change in the Latinx community is slow, sexual violence prevention is a new concept that will take time to understand and achieve support.
- Parental support in the Latinx community has demonstrated to be a challenge. Uniting with other educational programs offered at the school for parents, has appeared to be more successful.
- Culturally specific material is hard to find, especially when you need material in Spanish. When looking for material you need to think outside the box and utilize the community’s knowledge on the subject.
Why It's Needed
A student came in the class extremely upset about something that had happened at home. The student shared that after learning some statistics in the class regarding sexual violence, she went home to share the information. The family members didn’t believe the information; the student continued to educate her family, but there was no interest in the information. The student stated that she will continue to teach her siblings the material she learns in the classroom, because she believes it’s important for them to be aware and educated in sexual violence and healthy relationships. ‘I find that students are eager to make a social change regarding sexual violence, but like in this scenario, there is no interest from the family. In the Latinx culture, family is the main source of believes, attitudes, and behaviors. Continuing to educate Latinx families in sexual violence and healthy relationships continue the movement.
Community Partners
- El Colegio Charter School
- Parents