AG Selects Local High Schools for Violence Prevention Training

Maura Healey (AP Photo/Steven Senne, File)

SANDWICH – Three local high schools were among over 30 across the state to receive on-site, in-depth training on violence prevention.

Sandwich High, Plymouth South High and South Shore Charter Public School will receive the training through the next phase of “Game Change”, the Attorney General’s anti-violence partnership with the New England Patriots.

Beginning this fall and continuing throughout the school year, staff from Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) will provide training on preventing relationship violence to more than 1,000 high school students.

Trained students will then be equipped to teach their younger peers about healthy relationships and bystander intervention.

“With Game Change, our goal is to stop cycles of violence by intervening at an early age,” said AG Healey. “We’re teaching young people about healthy relationships, empowering them to treat each other with respect, and giving them the tools they need to prevent and address relationship violence in their own lives and in their communities.

At each of the participating schools, 30 students will be trained as peer leaders in anti-violence strategies.

During the first phase of Game Change, which ran from January through May 2016, nearly 200 staff from 90 high schools and nine domestic violence organizations across the state were trained in the MVP curriculum.