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2019 Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month Theme is Here!
  

The 2019 Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month theme is officially here!

BUT how in the word did we come up with that?

Well..earlier this year, a young person named Zachary Mallory from Kansas City, MO submitted an idea to Break the Cycle’s 2019 Teen Dating Violence Awareness month theme competition.  

Zachary’s original entry stated, “Love is an open door …with consent.” Zach explained, “I came up with this idea because in relationships there still needs to be boundaries and no means no!

The “…with consent” part is important because it represents that both partners are in agreement with what is going to happen.”

Zach’s theme hit home for a lot of young people, and once they were selected as the winner of the competition, a workgroup of Let’s Be Real (LBR) members immediately got together and spent some time unpacking the phrase.

The LBR workgroup wanted to see if they could tweak Zach’s idea to make it even more authentic and real for young people across the country.

During this brainstorming session the LBR members were asked four specific questions:

  1. What do we like about the current theme?
  2. How do we want other young people to FEEL when they see the Teen Dating Violence Awareness month theme?
  3. What do we want other young people to KNOW when they see our theme?
  4. How do we want to tweak the original theme to make it even better?

Here are highlights from the conversation that took place during the workgroup’s brainstorming session.

Break the Cycle works with young people between the ages of 12 – 24 years old, and for the majority of people between this age range, this will be the first time they fall in love.

Your first love sets you up for the rest of your life, and it is how you will define and see other relationships.

When young people see the Teen Dating Violence Awareness month theme we want them to feel supported, educated, empowered, secure, and safe.

In addition, we want them to know that there are different types of healthy relationships, and you have the ability to find the uniqueness in relationships from your very first love.

It’s true, you are opening a door that can be either positive or negative, but you have choices and options. Take time to find new things about yourself that works for you, but make sure to set clear boundaries.

After considering the first three questions the group finally made it to the last one.

So how do we want to tweak the original theme to make it better?

They Answered:

“Well, we need to keep the …with Consent part, because that’s how we will educate and empower other young people. However, we want to change the first part of the theme from “Your love is an open door” to “Your Love is Unique.”

The group felt that all of their ideas about young love and your first love was captured with this particular phrase.

Thus, the 2019 Teen Dating Violence Awareness month theme received the stamp of approval from our LBR members who are young people from across the country.

So for this February, Break the Cycle wants you to remember that

Your Love Is Unique …with Consent!