YES Program offered to Yavapai County schools in 2025-26
COTTONWOOD, Ariz. — In effort to continue raising awareness on domestic violence, Verde Valley Sanctuary (VVS) provides local schools with the opportunity to be part of one of its longest-standing programs within the agency, the Youth Empowerment Services (YES) Program.
Aimed at equipping young people in the Verde Valley and beyond with the skills to resist violence and abuse, along with information to help empower them to make positive choices, the YES Program fosters an early investment in prevention and intervention strategies that promote healthy parent-child relationships, friendships, and dating relationships.
According to a 2023 study completed by the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, between three and 10 million children and teens witness domestic violence each year. Additionally, the National Domestic Violence Hotline reports that one in 15 children are exposed to intimate partner violence annually, with 90% of them witnessing violence.
And that’s not all.
A study published by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in 2018 revealed that an average of 137 women across the world are killed by a partner or family member every day. There’s no way to know in how many of those cases a child was present, or even in the next room.
And in a study done during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the U.S. Department of Justice reported that 25% of kids are exposed to family violence during their lifetime.
Amanda Majewski, Training and Education Manager for VVS, has taught the YES Program in local schools for four years. She said that because of those unfortunate facts, she believes it’s important for all local youth to be educated early on about domestic violence.
“It’s invigorating, knowing that the education they are receiving could possibly change the future for some of these students,” Majewski said. “Being educated on how to manage their emotions and what signs to look out for in a healthy versus unhealthy relationship early in their lives will help them greatly in adulthood.”
Majewski updates the presentations frequently so that the YES Program is relatable to their current lives.
“It’s a fun way to learn while connecting as a class. The curriculum is centered around topics that they will most likely experience in their lives,” Majewski said. “After the five-week course they will have the tools, they need to help them through situations safely and confidently. It may not have been something they learned otherwise.”
The five-week course has different levels of discussion and topics to accommodate kindergarten all the way up to eighth grade students.
Community Based Advocacy Director Vivien Mann said the agency delivers many services to survivors of domestic and sexual violence after the fact, but the YES Program provides staff with an opportunity to offer preventative services.
“One of our main focuses is to go ‘upstream’ and see if we can offer prevention services so that the violence does not occur and individuals are safer,” Mann said. “For that goal we offer an evidenced-based program that teaches healthy relationships to educate individuals on what constitutes a healthy relationship and how to watch for ‘warning signs’ of an unhealthy relationship.”
Currently, the YES Program provides classroom training in several schools across the Verde Valley and in Yavapai County including Camp Verde Middle School and Canon Elementary School in Black Canyon City. Clarkdale-Jerome School District is welcoming the YES Program during the 2025-26 school year. On average, each classroom is provided with five courses per school year during a five-week period, with interactive presentations and conversations where the presenters encourage youth input.
The YES Program curriculum includes empowerment, self-awareness, bullying, peer pressure, stress and relaxation, gratitude, body image, empathy and compassion, healthy and unhealthy relationships, red flag-green flag training, and mental health. Each class begins with icebreakers and ends with an engaging activity like the program’s own version of “Family Feud.”
The YES Program is also available at the Cottonwood Public Library, 100 S. 6th St., every Monday from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. for children ages 8 to 12 and continues into the summer months with the “YES I Can” program.
For more information, visit VerdeValleySanctuary.org, navigate to the “Get Educated” tab and click YES Program, or visit VerdeValleySanctuary.org/yes-program.
If school administrators or board members are interested in having the YES Program in their district, reach out to Majewski via email at amanda@verdevalleysanctuary.org, or call 928-821-5611.
About
Verde Valley Sanctuary’s mission is to provide safety, services, and comfort to survivors of domestic and sexual violence. The agency began in 1993 as a grassroots organization with a leased modular home that slept six and has grown into a 32-bed emergency shelter with transitional housing options, a lay legal advocacy center, community-based advocacy support, a 24/7/365 crisis hotline (928-634-2511) and a staff that takes pride in its youth violence prevention education and public outreach and awareness. VVS is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and qualifying charitable organization for the Arizona Tax Credit. Federal Tax ID: #86-071314; QCO Code: #20041. Visit VerdeValleySanctuary.org for more information.