More than 80 students from five high schools participated in a day of training in November so that they can serve as leaders the Expect Respect program.

The Consortium for Public Education offers Expect Respect to western Pennsylvania high schools in partnership with Womansplace to help teenagers recognize abuse and build healthy relationships.

Among other things, bringing high school leadership teams together enabled The Consortium and Womansplace to show students “that teen dating violence just doesn’t happen in their school. It happens everywhere in every school,” said Diane Dahm-Martin, an Expect Respect support group coordinator from Womansplace, a domestic violence referral agency.

Some of the topics students discussed during the training were sexual harassment; warning signs of dating violence; limits that should be respected in relationships and the roles of power, status and privilege. The topics were presented through role-playing, small group conversations and games.

“Having the students take hold of these topics by either acting them out or holding a deep discussion among their peers is a more powerful way to have them learn,” said Nick Hartman, a Womansplace domestic violence counselor. “There’s the typical lecture-style format, which delivers the message, and then there’s this approach, which gets the students actively involved in the learning process.”