Wayne Barnes
Mr. Barnes, M.A., is the community educator and advocate for the Metropolitan Center for Women and Children; an agency that serves the greater New Orleans metropolitan area. Metro is a dual agency in that it serves the needs of both domestic violence (D.V.) and sexual assault (S.A.) survivors. Mr. Barnes does public outreach presentations to a diverse set of audiences on the issues of D.V, S.A., Stalking and Human Trafficking. These audiences include schools, staff and students, police departments, social groups, medical professionals, military, churches and social service agencies.
Mr. Barnes addresses the core issues related to these subjects where prevention and awareness are the primary goals of these presentations. The assumption is to educate and re-educate the public by dispelling myth, creating awareness and offering some social change solutions that will, in the end, reduce the number of future incidents. The model Mr. Barnes uses is taken from prevailing schools of thought that include, Duluth Model, a public health perspective, and a social change strategy. The core issues have been extrapolated and combined to create a comprehensive outlook of the subjects D.V. and S.A. The core issues in particular are risk factors, socialization, acceptance, self-esteem and lack of awareness all of which contribute to the manifestation and continued perpetration of these social problems. The presentations can be modified to accommodate any audience, for example, gender specific audiences, age appropriate, mental health professionals and other allied professionals.
The intended result of these presentations gives the audiences an opportunity to hear relevant and useful information that allow the listener to self-evaluate and examine D.V. and S.A. in the context of each perspective offered. Given that these subjects are highly integrated and multi-faceted, the listener is challenged to evaluate and examine each subject against his/her own perspective. The result of this evaluation is the foundation of what is intended by these presentations, social change.