Our Work

Core Programming

  • Phase 1: Independent Reflection

    How it works: Profile 1 (community members who have caused violent harm) and Profile 2 (their surrounding communities) participate in individual Workshops that teach the connection between traumatic experiences and violent patterns of behavior. Each Workshop is tailored to meet the needs and understanding of both groups’ unique relationship with community violence. Workshops also cover the systemic drivers of the conditions that lead to collective, community trauma.

  • Phase 2: Collective Healing

    How it works: Both Profiles come together to engage in transformative, transparent dialogue about community violence-related trauma through both visual and performance art modalities. The group also attends a team building trip for prosocial exposure and bonding.

  • Phase 3: Public Demonstration

    How it works: Both Profiles present their art and transformative insight to the community at large. This includes gallery showings, musical performances, theater openings and much more. Demonstrations seek to promote mutual empathy, social awareness and collective efficacy across the community audiences.

Additional Program Offerings

Holistic Support

All participants engage in mandatory in-house therapy throughout the program experience in order to get emotional support and achieve insight while receiving wraparound case management services to ensure they are thriving in their personal lives.

Support Referrals include,

  • Housing

  • Employment

  • Education

  • Outpatient Mental Health Support

  • Basic Needs

Paid Alumni Leadership Program

The Revivalists

It is critical to center those with lived experience to facilitate healing work. That said, The Village Revival Project also incorporates paid alumni leadership opportunities so participants can leverage their own experiences and program insight to transition into Model Specialists.

The Revivalists are compensated as part-time employees to implement this model in a variety of other settings- where harm took place- throughout the community. The Revivalists’ final art demonstration involves community beautification. 

Amina Bey, Board Member

 "Community Empathy for those who have caused harm to our community is crucial for the revival of the village because we cannot revive what we have not healed. We have to heal the wounds and trauma that created the conditions under which the community's children felt that they had no choice but to turn against their own home."

Mark Comesañas, Board Member

“Unfortunately the impact of violence reverberates in our communities for many years. Restoration however, is possible. Particularly if we include those who have inflicted harm as a way of truly finding healing for themselves, our families, and ultimately our community. This form of reconciliation is necessary and benefits us all.”

Impact Goals

Build Empathy

Empathy is when both groups of community members (those who have caused harm and their surrounding communities) begin to understand how violence-related trauma has impacted them both by sharing their own perspectives with each other in a safe space.

Raise Social Awareness

Social Awareness is the ability to take the perspective of and empathize with others from diverse backgrounds and cultures, to understand social and ethical norms for behavior, and to recognize family, school, and community resources and supports. Another nuanced aspect of social awareness, in this case, is understanding the the ripple effect of violence.

Foster Collective Efficacy

Collective Efficacy is when a community shares the belief that through their unified efforts they can overcome challenges and produce intended results. In communities where neighbors share the belief that they can band together to overcome violence, there is significantly less violence.