Promotoras
East Los Angeles Women’s Center in Los Angeles, CA expanded the community’s capacity to provide culturally and linguistically specific services for immigrant Latinas by training and empowering Latinas from their community to be “Promotoras” who provide outreach, prevention education and referrals to Latinas who are at risk and who are survivors of sexual violence.
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Communities
Adults Communities of color Immigrant/Refugee Latinx Survivors Women -
System
Advocacy/rape crisis Therapeutic/mental health -
Level
Local -
Asset PDF
Strategies
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Learning Circles
Promotora Conference at the California Endowment brought together 110 Promotoras to focus was on self-care, vicarious trauma and empowerment.
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Build Champions
Some 87 women trained to become Promotoras in 4 collectives representing East Los Angeles, Boyle Heights, City of Compton and South Los Angeles.
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Provide Resources
Promotoras are trained to respond to disclosures of violence against the specific survivor and to identify with the survivors needs. A Promotora will refer a survivor to the direct services staff to assess and plan with the survivor the options and services to meet the survivors' needs. A survivor is more likely to receive services and follow through with the service plan since a relationship of trust developed by the Promotora has already been established.
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Educate & Train
The project follows a train-the-trainer model for outreach work within and by the Latina community. The 87 Promotoras (Goal 65) conducted community presentations on sexual violence and prevention to 815 (Goal 450) people.
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Measure Impact
Evaluation data indicated that 93% of those who participated in the program increased their knowledge on issues of sexual and domestic violence. Women in the collectives shared that attending monthly power circles increases their motivation to continue doing this work, provided them with the knowledge and skills they learned to provide effective presentations to their communities.