Advocacy
What is Advocacy?
Advocacy is helping survivors to access, mediate, negotiate, and navigate systems in order to reduce harm and support individuals as they engage in healing through a trauma-informed approach that lets our understanding of trauma's impact on student functioning guide our work, while maintaining a survivor-centered focus that prioritizes survivor agency and harm reduction to reduce the burden on survivors as they navigate their healing journey, and using an empowerment-based framework that aims to restore power to survivors so they can make informed decisions that feel best for them throughout their healing process.
What Do Advocates Do?
Advocates provide emotional and administrative support through coordinating interim measures, accommodations, and other supports, offer psycho-education on trauma's impact and the cycle of violence, create confidential space for survivors to discuss and process their feelings and reactions, and connect survivors with on and off-campus referrals and resources. This advocacy work is trauma-informed (understanding trauma's impact on every aspect of a student's life), survivor-centered (prioritizing survivor agency and harm reduction to reduce burden during the healing journey), and empowerment-based (providing complete, accurate, up-to-date information for truly informed decision-making). However, advocacy is not a substitute for counseling despite potentially feeling therapeutic, does not include medical advice though survivors are encouraged to access medical care, and cannot provide legal advice, though advocates work closely with local organizations that offer free legal services for survivors.