A Program evaluation of The One Love Foundation’s Escalation Workshop

Intimate partner violence (IPV) affects 10 million individuals and accounts for 15% of all violent crime in the United States (U.S.) every year. IPV extends beyond physical injury and can result in death; accounting for 16% (about 1 in 6) of murder victims. In that 16%, nearly 50% are female victims (926 out of 1809 IPV homicide victims) in the U.S. are killed by an intimate partner. The One Love Foundation created a 90-minute, peer facilitator-lead educational program, The Escalation Workshop (Escalation), that aims to provide education through a short film and group discussion about the warning signs and characteristics of unhealthy relationships in 2010 in an effort to save lives; however, this workshop has not been scientifically validated. As such, the aim this study was to evaluate the efficacy of Escalation utilizing the Rapid Feedback Evaluation (RFE) model. A total of 152 adults (137 women; 42.90% White/European-American; median age 19) were recruited from a Tier 2 university in southwestern United States from December 2018 to February 2019 and completed Escalation as well as pre-, post-, and two-month follow up intervention surveys. Overall, results of statistical analyses revealed that Escalation provides education to participants in identifying characteristics of unhealthy relationship behaviors and safely intervening in situations of IPV, which are believed to ultimately contribute to lowering statistics related to IPV.