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NEWS

ARCH-ED – Helping our children and young people to navigate challenging times.

My name is Yasmin, I am the facilitator for the ARCH-ED Prevention Programme. Facilitating this programme and engaging with the young people has been such a delight. Not only have we delivered lots of content, but I have been privileged that our young community have shown me further insight to the challenges they face in today’s world.

Today I want to share some of the learning that we have experienced so far throughout this prevention work.

ARCH-ED is a collective of a seven-session programme that explores topics such as gender, consent, sexualisation and pornography, sexual violence and how to help prevent sexual violence and social media and its impact. The delivery has been provided as stand-alone sessions or as a full programme delivery. We have worked with some great schools and youth settings and worked with many children from the ages of 10 years to 16 plus. The programme is also flexible so it can be adapted to support the schools’ needs if they highlight any issues that they feel they need support in addressing, for example, exploring the impact of influencer Andrew Tate.  

Delivering the programme has highlighted even more that forms of sexual violence are experienced every day for young people.

 In some of the groups we have held when exploring sexting, young people have stated that sending or requests for “nudes” without consent is their normal, with ‘everyone doing it’ and with some young people thinking it is part of a relationship. It is important that through these sessions, that we are having discussions about image sharing whilst also informing our young people about the law around this.

There are themes across the board that show our young people have limited understanding of healthy and unhealthy relationships, with concerns raised around the lack of identifying sexual harassment and sexualized language or seeing these as a problem or that they were happening within intimate relationships and friendships. The young people did not deem this as something that would be a ‘red flag’.  When exploring sexual violence further, a lot of the young people identified physical acts of sexual violence with no other forms being identified.  Sexual harassment in particular demonstrated how desensitized our young people were to this and how they feel there is nothing to be done, or that speaking out has larger consequences with peers.

The access our young people have to online content and their environments have a large impact on the way in which they navigate through their life. The internet is an important part of their world and it will and does impact them highly, some more than others. Although the government look for ways to protect our young people in their online presence, this is something we may be working with for the foreseeable. In exploring social media with our young people, we acknowledged that it was important to not just highlight the negative aspects but also the positives, such as connecting with other people and sharing memories.

This stands to show the importance of our work to not be a stand-alone one-off engagement for our young people but to be something that is repeated to engrave the understanding of such subjects as consent, sexualisation, and social media to better equip them. It is scary to think they will come across things like pornography without the search for such content. But our programme can help them to understand these important topics, educate them to challenge and inform what is normal, what is right and demonstrate other perspectives. Relationships will be a part of our young people’s lives and in educating on the true understanding of what consent in and not only to seek it but how to give and feel ok in retracting it. These things will better support our young people.

That is why I feel so passionate in reaching as many young people as possible and repeating the work with them to give them the tools to support better sexual health understanding, better wellbeing and given them better informed choices.

For more information about the ARCH-ED Prevention Programme visit our Get Informed page of our website or contact Yasmin on y.chambers@archteesside.org

Our centre offers a safe environment for you to come and talk. We offer women only spaces in our Middlesbrough office on a Wednesday 5-7pm, Friday 8.30-5pm, and in our Stockton & Hartlepool outreach venues.

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Self Referral Terms

Please read the following information before completing  this referral:

  • ARCH Teesside are a victim focused organisation and as such we do not accept referrals for anyone who is subject (the suspect) to an ongoing police investigation for sexual, domestic, or violent offences, or for anyone who may pose a risk of harm to others.
  • ARCH Teesside Counselling Service provides therapeutic support for anyone in Middlesbrough, Stockton and Hartlepool who has experienced rape or any form of sexual abuse at any time in their lives and is struggling to cope with their feelings and emotions in relation to these experiences.
  • We also offer support to Men and Boys from Redcar and Cleveland. We work in partnership to support the needs of children and young people.
  • Therapy can be hard work and extremely challenging, especially in the early days. We are unable provide emergency crisis support or work with complex or severe mental health issues. For anyone who is struggling with issues relating to substance misuse, other services should also be considered. 

I confirm that the person being referred does not pose a risk of harm to others, and is not known to Police regarding violent or sexual offences.

By ticking this box, I / the person being referred agree for checks to be made regarding their risk status.

ARCH Teesside reserve the right to refuse referrals and the provision of services. All relevant risk and need information should be sent with the referral, contact 01642 822335 for more information. This referral cannot be submitted unless the above information is confirmed.

CONTINUE TO REFERRAL FORM

Professional Referral Terms

Please read the following information before continuing with this referral:

  • ARCH Teesside are a victim focused organisation and as such we do not accept referrals for anyone who is subject (the suspect) to an ongoing police investigation for sexual, domestic, or violent offences, or for anyone who may pose a risk of harm to others.
  • ARCH Teesside Counselling Service provides therapeutic support for anyone in Middlesbrough, Stockton and Hartlepool who has experienced rape or any form of sexual abuse at any time in their lives and is struggling to cope with their feelings and emotions in relation to these experiences.
  • We also offer support to Men and Boys from Redcar and Cleveland. We work in partnership to support the needs of children and young people.
  • Therapy can be hard work and extremely challenging, especially in the early days. It is therefore important that you consider the appropriateness of ARCH for the client’s needs before making a referral.
  • For example, we are unable provide emergency crisis support or work with complex or severe mental health issues. Please speak to our referrals team on (01642) 822335 to discuss needs and appropriateness if you are unsure.
  • In the best interests of the person being referred, consideration should be given to specialist services for anyone who is struggling with issues relating to substance misuse.

I confirm that the person being referred does not pose a risk of harm to others, and is not known to Police regarding violent or sexual offences.

By ticking this box, I / the person being referred agree for checks to be made regarding their risk status.

ARCH Teesside reserve the right to refuse referrals and the provision of services. All relevant risk and need information should be sent with the referral, contact 01642 822335 for more information. This referral cannot be submitted unless the above information is confirmed.

CONTINUE TO REFERRAL FORM