Information & Education Project
The Big Lottery-Funded Information and Education Project at Shakti Women’s Aid works towards breaking the barriers to support that BME women, children and young people who experience domestic abuse face in Scottish society. One of the main aims of the project is to work with statutory and voluntary sector agencies to help them reach out to and work with BME victims of domestic abuse with greater effectiveness and sensitivity. The project achieves this objective by offering training, workshops, inputs at meetings and consultancy to agencies and their workers.
An important outcome of the work of the project in recent years is that Shakti has come to be recognised as an important voice on BME women and young people’s issues in Scotland. It has established itself more firmly within local and national strategy, policy and service planning groups.
The project also works with members of the community, especially young people, to raise awareness on the issue of domestic abuse and honour based crimes. It works with schools, youth groups and other community based organisations to reach out to young people and BME women in the community. A direct outcome of this awareness raising is an increase in the number of referrals including self referrals from participants.
Apart from this, the project supervises a highly successful work experience program for high school students and a placement program for university students and young adults from Overseas and within the UK.
