The Mentors in Violence Prevention Program (MVP) is an approach to gender violence and bullying prevention and is designed to give students the skills to speak out against issues which affect relationships within our schools and communities by adopting a positive ‘bystander’ approach.
Through peer mentoring, younger students are encouraged to consider and discuss different scenarios such as behaviour online, the use of harmful language, coercive control, gender labelling and alcohol and consent. They are then provided with a range of safe options which can prevent situations from escalating.
To access the Scottish Government’s Equally Safe: Scotland’s Strategy for Eradicating Violence Against Women and Girls Policy 2023, click here. To access the Scottish Government’s Preventing and Responding to Gender Based Violence: A Whole School Framework, click GBV National Framework for Schools.
MVP is currently running in ten of our secondary schools with over 400 pupil mentors taking part in two days of training where they had the opportunity to consider issues around child protection, gender box, recognising respectful and abusive language and behaviour and developing skills in leadership and facilitation. Mentors are able to gain accreditation for their work through a range of awards from the SQA and the Scottish Government’s Saltire Award. In 2017, Paisley Grammar School’s mentors gained recognition at Renfrewshire Youth Services Awards and, in 2019, were filmed by BBC North for a news article on tackling knife crime. In 2023, our Young and Equally Safe in Renfrewshire project was recognised at the Renfrewshire Youth Services Awards. Earlier in 2024, pupils from Trinity High School were filmed by BBC Scotland news for an article on school behaviour.
We are delighted to have piloted Education Scotland’s MVP training for colleagues within Primary and Early Years sectors and look forward to growing our trainer team later in 2024. To access MVP’s primary focused lessons on social inclusion, click here. These lessons can be delivered from P5-7.
Since October 2021, following a successful bid to the Scottish Government’s Equally Safe Fund, we have been working with Renfrewshire Youth Services
to take MVP into the community. For more information regarding our Equally Safe in Renfrewshire work, contact Fiona White or Emma Muir (Youth Services Lead) at emma.muir@renfrewshire.gov.uk This work is on-going thanks to continued funding.
Click here to access Education Scotland’s annual MVP reports.
The programme relies on building successful partnerships across Education, Health, Youth Services and Police Scotland with over 200 staff trained across all sectors by our own training team. The training team consists includes:
- Jane Ahlfeld – Home Link Worker
- Mark Fulton – PT Pupil Support, St. Andrew’s Academy
- Kevin Gillick – Youth Services
- Ashlinn McAleer – Victim Support Scotland
- Cameron Malcolm – PT Pupil Support, Renfrew High School
- Andrew Mitchell – Active School, OneRen
- Emma Muir – Youth Services
- Cheryl Thomas – Programmes Development Manager – Active Communities
- Fiona White – Development Officer Health and Wellbeing
If you wish further information regarding the programme, please contact Fiona White (Coordinator) by email – fiona.hewitt@renfrewshire.gov.uk
You can find clips of our mentors on our Health and Wellbeing YouTube channel.
- BBC North article on Scotland’s approach to violent crime
- 16 Days of Action 2021
- Youth Group of the Year 2017
To hear discussion from around gender-based violence from Jackson Katz who developed the programme in America, click on the clip above. This session was hosted by St Pauls Youth Forum in Glasgow.
Click here to access Education Scotland’s Wakelet on Domestic Abuse.
Click here to access Education Scotland’s MVP Wakelet.
