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Through JWI’s program Strong Girls, Healthy Relationships, JWI’s helps ensure girls are confident and have the skills to make smart, healthy choices throughout their lives. Offered in a dynamic 12-hour, 6-session curriculum or 3-hour, 3-session mini-curriculum, Strong Girls, Healthy Relationships engages girls in structured discussions and activities to help them interactively explore empowerment and self-esteem in the context of relationships they build, the way they perceive themselves, and how they envision their futures. Each session focuses on a different topic, such as the language of relationships, what constitutes abuse, and the role of female friendship.

Now JWI is answering the call for boys as well.

JWI is offering a companion curriculum to Strong Girls entitled Good Guys, Healthy Relationships. The three-hour, three-session mini-curriculum helps boys explore issues of masculinity, power and control, violence, self-esteem, conflict resolution, coming of age, and the importance of partnership and equality in friendships and relationships.

Good Guys, Healthy Relationships addresses the pressure boys feel from culture and media to “act like a man,” as well as the messages they receive about asserting masculinity through aggression and violence. In addition, the sessions deal with the concept of Jewish manhood, the challenges boys face in being the “good guy,” and redefining masculinity in a healthy, positive and constructive way.