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Back to Home > News > Saturday, Feb 25, 2006 Nation email this print this reprint or license this... Adolescent date violence f
To answer this call, Kenmore High held a program on teenage violence Friday morning, with most students attending one of two hourlong sessions. Cuyahoga Falls and Hudson high schools recently had similar programs through a new effort by Akron Children's Hospital.
The program blends a PowerPoint presentation on facts and myths about violence, with students at the school performing vignettes of real-life situations.
In one of Kenmore's skits, student Chelsey James portrayed a girl who was raped by her date, got pregnant and had an abortion. Charles Truss played her brother, who supported her through this difficult experience while also feeling guilty about having tried to ``get some'' during a recent party.
Jackie Towne, another student, portrayed a teen who was being stalked by a boy she dated only once. Shaynese Sykes took on the role of a girl stuck in an abusive relationship with the father of her baby.
Karen Mascolo, a nurse at Children's Hospital who moderated the program, encouraged students to tell an adult if they are physically or sexually assaulted.
During a Q-and-A period in the early session, a male student talked about how his sister's boyfriend has been abusing her. He said he tried to solve the problem by beating up her boyfriend.
Mascolo told him the answer to violence isn't more violence. She suggested he encourage his sister to call the police or a local social service agency.
Shaynese was surprised to hear the large percentage of Kenmore students who say they've been in abusive relationships. She said she knows people in violent relationships but has never been in one herself.
Kathie Capriolo, a family consumer sciences teacher at Kenmore, heard about the violence program and set about bringing it to the school. The presentation took about five months to prepare, including promotion, rehearsals and notifying parents.
As part of the program, Mascolo surveys students before and after to see if their knowledge and perceptions have changed. The surveys are anonymous -- only identifying students using celebrity names for tracking purposes.
Mascolo said the survey showed a change in students perceptions in several areas. For example, more students in the pre-survey than the post-survey agreed with the myth that only ``easy girls'' are victims of violence.
Mascolo points to one survey result she's proud of: 85 percent of the students who have seen the program thought it was worthwhile. She hopes to use this statistic to secure grant money to bring the effort to more local schools. She'd love to see it taught to all Summit County freshmen.
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