The charitable foundation Sylni (Sylni) has completed an awareness-raising project about the implementation of the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combatting violence against women and domestic violence (Istanbul Convention) in Ukraine.
The action entitled “Stop to violence: raising teenage boys to respect women and girls” aimed to contribute to the prevention of violence against women in Ukraine by addressing harmful gender stereotypes, misogynistic attitudes, and lack of social and emotional learning opportunities for boys.
The project focused on equipping key adult influencers in adolescents’ lives - parents, teachers, and school psychologists - with practical tools to promote emotional intelligence, non-violent behaviour, and respectful attitudes towards women and girls. By targeting adult influencers rather than only direct beneficiaries, the project supported preventive approaches, in line with the principles of the Istanbul Convention.
Key activities included:
- development and delivery of a structured five-module online course providing concrete tools, including emotional regulation exercises such as the «ЗУПИНИСЬ–ВДИХНИ–СКАЖИ» (Stop-Breathe-Tell) technique, model phrases for discussing consent with teenagers, and practical strategies for responding to sexist jokes or harmful peer behaviour. Almost 2000 individuals followed the course.
- targeted awareness-raising among parents, teachers, and psychologists through digital outreach, media publications, partner networks and targeted advertising, reaching more than 600 000 views.
“I can’t control the whole world. But I want to do my part to make sure my son never becomes the cause of someone else’s trauma.”
This sentence, said by a mother and a friend of mine, became the starting point for this course. Together with the team of the “Sylni” Foundation, we created a short video course for parents raising boys and young men. Across five lectures, we explore how to help boys grow into men who build a strong sense of self-worth, recognise and process emotions, respect others, and never become the source of another person’s pain.” - Yaryna Vyshenska, author of the course, behavioural change researcher, and specialist in strategic communications and impact design.
This action was one of two initiatives selected under the call for proposals of the Council of Europe project “Combating Violence against Women in Ukraine – Phase III” which is part of the Council of Europe Action Plan for Ukraine “Resilience, Recovery and Reconstruction” 2023-2026.
