RESOURCE

Stay Safe and Know Your Legal Rights Training Manual

November 12, 2015

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Since 1994, the year GMSA was founded, self-advocates have been speaking up about their right to live safely in their communities. Our goals include providing abuse prevention education for youth and adults with developmental disabilities, their family members, community service providers, and advocates. A key element is teaching individuals with developmental disabilities (self-advocates) to be co-trainers of abuse prevention workshops.

Stay Safe and Know Your Legal Rights does not include sexuality education. In Vermont, this curriculum was taught to students who had already received sexuality education as part of their high school’s health class curriculum. It is highly recommended that sexuality education be taught as part of an overall abuse prevention program. Unfortunately, many students with developmental disabilities do not have sufficient opportunities to learn about abuse prevention or sexual education because some people worry it may frighten or upset the student. Often, talking about sexuality can be uncomfortable for some family members and support staff. However, sexual education enables a person to recognize if they are being sexually abused and enhances a person’s ability to provide accurate information when reporting sexual abuse. “Experience has shown that prevention and sexuality education not only helps to prevent abuse, it can help to increase self-esteem, support assertiveness, enhance understanding of personal rights and increase self-awareness of needs and desires in relationships with others” (SafePlace, 1999).

PART 1: STAY SAFE

Unit 1: Communication