Youth Violence Prevention Social Marketing Campaign Raise Your Standards, Not Your Fists

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Youth Violence Prevention Social Marketing
CampaignRaise Your Standards, Not Your Fists

• Elihu Brayboy
• Wendy Loomas
• Pinellas County Health Department
• Violence Prevention Office
• Wendy_Loomas_at_doh.state.fl.us - 727.824.6979
• Elihu_Brayboy_at_doh.state.fl.us - 727.824.6962

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Pinellas County Demographics

• Pinellas County is the most densely populated
  county in Florida
• The county is completely urban
• Population is just under 1 million
• Racial make-up is approximately 88 white, 10
  Black (African-American primarily), 2 Asian
• About 3.5 Hispanic
• Includes 18 municipalities largest cities are
  St. Petersburg, Clearwater, Pinellas Park, and
  Largo
• School district is 7th largest in Florida serving
  113,000 students in 144 schools

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Pinellas County Health Department

• Five major clinic sites with 600 employees
• Just under 200 staff in home visiting programs
  Healthy Start and Healthy Families
• Clinic sites primarily provide womens health
  services, STD and HIV testing and services,
  childrens and adult immunizations, and WIC
  recent new division formed around wellness grant
• Pinellas CHD has a strong reputation for
  partnering (e.g. 80 home visiting staff are
  contracted through other agencies)
• Pinellas CHD administration is committed to a
  grant philosophy that is non-competitive in
  nature basically, we will be the lead if asked
  and no other local agency can or wishes to

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History of Violence Prevention Office within
Pinellas CHD

• 1997 NACCHO Conference
• June, 1998, Board of County Commissioners
  proposed a 200,000 annual increase for CHD
• The Violence Prevention and Car Seat Safety
  programs were created with 1 coordinator and 1
  clerical staff each, October 1, 1998
• The initial 2 projects for the VPO were to
  improve the Health Departments response to
  domestic violence and to be involved with the
  Partnerships for Preventing Violence

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VPO Projects 1998-2003

• Seeded a community mediation program following
  civil unrest in south St Petersburg
• Created model form and policy for routine
  screening for domestic violence in CHD statewide
  implementation occurred Spring, 2003
• Partnered with 4 local agencies to implement Safe
  Start Partnership which improves the system
  response to young children who witness violence
• Initiated workplace violence prevention policy
  and staff training throughout CHD
• Partnered with school district to receive and
  implement 3-year Safe Schools/Healthy Students
  grant

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Safe Schools/Healthy Students

• Pinellas was in the first group of 54 school
  districts to receive this award
• Pinellas was the only site that included a social
  marketing component in its application
• Subcontract for CHD began in Dec, 1999
  (100,000/year for 3 years)
• CHD/VPO hired FT coordinator with private sector
  marketing experience
• Coordinator subcontracted with local university
  for market research, and with local youth group
  to lead design of campaign

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Social Marketing Model

• Initial research indicated middle school was best
  focus audience
• Subsequent research focused on how 11-14 year
  olds are most influenced
• Meanwhile, high school-aged youth were trained in
  basic social marketing principles and worked with
  ad agency and university researcher to create and
  test market brand (slogan, logo/graphic, and
  tagline)
• Youth also developed 6-session curriculum for 3
  middle schools, designed for a team of high
  school youth to lead each middle school (ignoring
  the results of our own research!)

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Product Roll Out

• June, 2001, the Raise Your Standards, Not Your
  Fists graphic was unveiled at a press conference,
  followed by 50 billboards countywide for one year
• October, 2001, skill-building workshops began in
  3 middle schools participants received campaign
  t-shirts, lanyards, stress balls, posters, pens
  schools received mouse pads for all computer
  labs, more posters for hallways, and coffee mugs
  for staff
• May, 2002 (end of school), 2 of the middle
  schools held peace rallies for all 6th graders

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Campaign Message
Youve Got the Power to Stop the
Violence www.youvegotthepower.net
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Early Challenges

• School system is not used to partnering, and did
  not assist in gaining entrée into schools
• Initial grant recipients did not understand
  social marketing and expected us to create the
  brochures and advertising for their existing
  programs
• Evaluator did not see the need to evaluate this
  component, so evaluation data is primarily
  narrative and anecdotal
• Youth-led workshops did not work well, primarily
  because the youth had little experience/knowledge
  of the subject matter (nonviolence) and they were
  not an age group influential with 6th graders
• 3 years of funding, even with one year extension,
  was not sufficient to create both brand
  recognition among the focus audience and see
  meaningful results of skill-building workshops

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Early Successes

• About half way through, we discovered we were
  unknowingly following a Best Practice from the
  Surgeon Generals report on Youth Violence, and
  have continued to do so
• A principal from one of the first middle schools
  to be part of the campaign named it in the
  newspaper as one of the key reasons his school
  received an A grade from the Governor
• Middle school students throughout the county
  recognize the slogan, and most middle schools
  have at least posters
• Due to staff turnover and vacancies, there were
  enough funds to continue an extra year

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The Current Campaign

• To improve effectiveness of workshops, we
  partnered with Alternatives to Violence Project
  to implement HIPP (Help Increase the Peace
  Program) using CHD and AVP staff as
  co-facilitators
• Since Jan, 2002, conducted HIPP workshops in 3
  middle schools and expanded to 5 alternative and
  drop out prevention sites (primarily girls-only)
• Billboards are continuing and promotional items
  are constantly changing to respond to youth
  interests (e.g. black t-shirts, gel pens,
  sweatbands)
• Just started in 4 elementary schools, Oct, 2003

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Supplemental Activities

• Sports-related youth summit
• African-American youth summit in neighborhood
  center
• Work with staff and youth following homicide
  on-site during event
• WIC staff retreat
• Urban League parent presentation

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Funding Issues

• Safe Schools funding ended Sept 30, 2003
• VPO clerical staff changed positions, leaving
  salary dollars behind, so we can temporarily fund
  the youth position
• CHD provided one-time funds for AVP
  co-facilitator, new t-shirts, and billboards for
  this semester, ending Dec, 2003
• Local domestic violence task force just received
  a CDC grant for primary prevention, and they are
  considering funding the coordinator position
  through the CHD, and focusing the campaign on
  young boys and men this may mean some campaign
  materials can be used in this campaign as well
• The position recently became a permanent one,
  showing a commitment on the part of the CHD to
  continue this program

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Benefits for CHD/Community

• CHD staff has benefited by having on-site
  resources in domestic violence, child abuse,
  workplace violence, and youth violence
• CHD clients have benefited by coming in contact
  with a more informed staff, and by having access
  to brochures, posters, etc on related topics
• CHD has a strong presence, thanks to VPO staff,
  on committees and projects that were never before
  seen as public health issues
• Statewide Injury and Violence Prevention efforts
  have increased, and Pinellas CHD is a key player
  in planning
• Violence Prevention efforts in the county can now
  access public health resources in data collection
  and analysis through VPO staff