Sharing Our Knowledge, Sharing Our
Solutions:
Summaries of the Pilot Workshops

In 1992-93, CCLOW's quarterly, Women's Education des femmes, published two special issues focusing on the connection between women's experience of violence and its impact on our access to education and our ability to learn. These issues stimulated so much interest that CCLOW decided to pursue this subject further; we were particularly interested in "Identifying the Barriers" generated by our experience of violence.

One outcome was the decision to develop a series of pilot workshops on the connection between violence against women and women's access to education. Through our four pilot projects, we worked with women and some men in several parts of Canada. With each group, we sought to first tell participants about the issues, and then to draw from them strategies for ensuring that women are not re-victimized by educational systems as well as strategies for prevention.

In CCLOW's Whitehorse workshop, Paula worked with college instructors and counsellors as well as representatives of funding agencies and the territorial government. In Prince Albert, three facilitators worked with a mainly female staff at the women's Provincial Correctional Centre to explore these issues within a very specialized context. In Toronto, we worked with Beat the Street Women's Committee to discover the ideas of literacy workers. In Montreal, we worked with The Centre for Literacy to design a workshop for educators and community workers. These groups represent the diversity of educational situations and opportunities that women can experience.

Summaries of these workshops can be found on the next few pages. Our hope is that these summaries will provide you, the reader, with a foundation from which to better understand the needs of learners who have experienced violence or are currently in a violent relationship. Together, we can better advocate for changes in our institutions in order to prevent further marginalization of women who have experienced violence.

If you want more information about the workshops, please contact us at: