About the Project

 
 
Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is one of the most serious causes of injury and death among women around the world. It is widely recognised that patriarchal societies and gender stereotypes are two of the root causal factors of IPV.
Effective primary prevention of IPV can be achieved via interventions aiming to prevent the establishment of or to modify already established stereotypical perceptions of gender roles, as well as to shape those beliefs that are essential for the development of healthy intimate relationships. The ideal setting to implement such interventions targeting the general population of pupils is the educational setting.
The Gender Equality Awareness Raising against Intimate Partner Violence (GEAR against IPV) project intends to contribute to primary prevention of IPV through a school-based intervention aiming to raise awareness and deconstruct the endorsed gender stereotypes of both high school students and teachers. Students of both genders are called upon, through the suitable and age-appropriate awareness raising material that is developed, to assess and challenge their culturally “inherited” stereotypes and to approach the differences between genders as individual differences rather than as characteristics of superiority of one gender over the other.
As teachers, like the rest of society, have their own perceptions on gender roles, they were also trained on issues of gender stereotyping and their links to IPV with a view to recognize that their behaviour may reflect stereotyped role models. They were also trained on IPV issues and provided with the appropriate skills to enable them to operate as multipliers via educating students.

Beneficiaries of the project were high school teachers and students of both genders. A total of 9 Seminars were organized, implemented and evaluated in Austria (3 Seminars in Vienna and Linz), Germany (5 Seminars in Brandenburg) and Greece (1 Seminar in Athens). The Seminars resulted in a total of 167 trained teachers and other school-related professionals and social work students (47 trainees in Greece, 51 in Austria, 69 in Germany). 

The specially trained teachers and other school-related professionals successfully implemented 27 “GEAR against IPV” workshops with students, aiming to raise their awareness on the harmful effects of gender stereotyping, IPV and dating violence and to encourage the development of attitudes of zero tolerance towards gender-based violence at a relatively young age, with the ultimate goal being to promote the development of healthy, equal and violent-free relationships between young people.
In the 27 Students’ Workshops that were implemented in Austria (11 workshops), Germany (3 workshops) and Greece (13 workshops), a total of 556 students participated (249 in Austria, 55 in Germany, 252 in Greece). The Workshops were implemented on the basis of the process described in the respective National Booklets III (Teachers’ Manual) by use of the material included in National Booklets IV (Students’ Activities Book). 

The project’s main activities were:
  • development of the “Gender Equality Awareness Raising against Intimate Partner Violence” (GEAR against IPV) Package in English; this educational material and the guidelines were developed based on a previous Daphne project and existing relevant material that was reviewed
  • adaptation and translation of the material into partners’ languages (DE-GR-AT-HR) and national contexts
  • implementation of Teachers’ Training Seminars 
  • implementation of IPV awareness-raising workshops in high schools
  • evaluation of the developed material and the project’s implementation (process and effectiveness evaluation)
  • dissemination of project’s outputs Nationally & EU-wide (Website, CD-ROM, Bookmarks).
From the evaluation results of the project it can be concluded that the project achieved to: a) develop and disseminate widely the culturally adapted and evaluated "GEAR against IPV" Packages, b) raised awareness of students on the harmful effects of gender stereotyping, c) sensitized adolescents on gender stereotypes, the process of deconstructing them and on how to develop safe & healthy relationships with zero tolerance towards violence, d) increased possibilities for adolescents to disclose when violence incidences occur, e) improved teachers’ understanding on gender stereotyping, their links to IPV & warning signs, f) teachers’ capacity building on using the developed material and implementing the GEAR against IPV workshops in schools.

The project's Outputs/Deliverables were:
Publications
  1. The Master GEAR against IPV Package (available in English) which consists of the following 4 booklets:
    • Booklet I: The Master GEAR against IPV Package and How to Develop your own National Package
    • Booklet II: Guidelines for Conducting a “GEAR against IPV” Teachers’ Seminar
    • Booklet III: “GEAR against IPV” Teachers’ Manual
      Booklet IV: “GEAR against IPV” Students’ Activities Book
  2. Four National “GEAR against IPV” Packages, which derived from translation, cultural adaptation and completion of the Master Package with country-specific information. The National Packages developed are the following:
    • The Austrian “GEAR against IPV” Package
    • The Croatian “GEAR against IPV” Package
    • The German “GEAR against IPV” Package
    • The Greek “GEAR against IPV” Package
  3. The Master and all National “GEAR against IPV” Packages are included in 15.000 CD-ROM copies that were produced (ISBN: 978-960-9569-00-2).
  4. The Project’s Dissemination Leaflet (15.000 printed copies) which is available in 5 languages/versions (English, Austrian, Croatian, German and Greek)
  5. 32.500 Bookmarks for students available in 7 versions (English, Austrian, Croatian, German, Greek, Turkish, Bosnian-Serbian-Croatian) 
  6. Training of 167 high school teachers and professionals related to high schools (e.g. School Social Workers, Social Work Students and Health Education Coordinators).
  7. Implementation of “GEAR against IPV Workshops” in 27 classes of high schools in Greece (13 workshops implemented in schools located in Athens, Larissa, Achaia, Serres and Milos), Germany (3 workshops implemented in schools located in Brandenburg) and Austria (11 workshops implemented in schools located in Lower Austria, Styria, Upper Austria). A total of 556 students (13-22 years old) comprised the intervention group (252 in Greece, 249 in Austria, 55 in Germany) and 458 students comprised the control group (264 in Greece, 161 in Austria, 33 in Germany).
  8. TheProject’s Website available in 4 languages (GR-DE-TR-EN)    
  9. Four consolidated Reports on the main activities of the project that were implemented in the partner countries, namely: 
  10. The Action Grant Final Narrative Report (submitted to DG Justice)
  11. The External Evaluation Report