Impact

CONTACT:

420 Pearl Street
Malden, MA 02148
781-321-3900
www.impactboston.com

Meg Stone, Acting Director

DESCRIPTION:

Impact, formerly the LiveSafe Foundation, was incorporated in 1995. It provides hands-on safety training to economically disadvantaged children, teens and adults, in collaboration with local schools, after-school programs, community centers and shelters. In 1997 it worked with 1,100 children and teens.

The statistics are grim: 84% of rapes are committed against people younger than 25; women with family incomes below $10,000 are five times more likely to be attacked than women with family incomes above $30,000; 40% of Boston high school students reported they had been in a fight in 1995; that same year, 13,429 incidences of domestic violence were reported to the Boston police. In 1996, 40,000 Massachusetts children witnessed violent assaults against their mothers.

Impact teaches not only physical self-defense, but awareness and prevention strategies in potentially dangerous situations. Many children and youth live in fear; this program teaches them that personal safety is a right, not a privilege, and that occasionally this right has to be asserted and defended.

What are the results? Many cases of actual attacks avoided, but also protection from domestic abuse, new calm in schools, new confidence and self-esteem among potential victims, and general relief of stress. This program is on-target; every indicator is positive, and it needs your help to grow.

(1998: HUMAN SERVICES: Children and Youth: General)