Cure Violence's (CV) public education campaign: How to amplify indivdiual and community change outcomes via an indicated media campaign

Cure Violence (CV) has emphasized a comprehensive, multi-level, community-based approach to working with the highest of high-risk youth and young adults in extremely disadvantaged and most often urban neighborhoods. In 2014, CV introduced a new public education campaign tailored to the needs of this high-risk target group with multiple messages emphasizing how to ‘help a friend’ avoid violence, and/or to engage in peaceful conflict resolution. The presentation will show examples of this campaign and how it was integrated with the multi-level intervention; for instance, how outreach workers reinforced the tag lines of the campaign thru 1:1 work, how it was incorporated into community dialogues and workshops, and how community activities were organized around these themes. Prior to the campaign, 400 surveys were conducted across three neighborhoods, two of which were CV sites and one control, and follow-up surveys will be conducted this summer. Data will be analyzed to assess basic outcomes like awareness of the campaign and gain in knowledge, as well as if there were any reported difference in behavior(s) when it comes to violence or potentially violent situations. Qualitative data (focus groups, interviews) will be utilized to augment lessons learned implementing a city-wide violence reduction and prevention media campaign. Implications for other community-based programs that extensively use community health workers will also be discussed.