Understanding and Responding to Intimate Partner Violence
Description
This 2-hour interactive course uses an immersive, role-based simulation to deepen participants' understanding of the barriers faced by individuals experiencing intimate partner violence (IPV), with particular attention to Veteran survivors. Participants assume the role of a Veteran survivor and navigate a sequence of realistic scenarios—drawn from lived experience—that require decisions about staying, leaving, and seeking help under conditions of limited financial resources, control, and isolation. The exercise illustrates contemporary dynamics of abuse, including economic control, technology-facilitated surveillance and stalking, weaponization of a survivor's service-connected condition, and the complex roles that systems such as the VA, courts, child protective services, law enforcement, and faith communities can play in either supporting or unintentionally increasing risk. Through a structured, trauma-informed debrief, participants examine the nonlinear reality of leaving and returning, identify how personal and systemic barriers shape survivor decision-making, and consider practical implications for their own professional response. The course is appropriate for law enforcement officers, victim advocates, social workers, and allied professionals, and emphasizes voluntary participation, participant safety, and containment throughout.
Description
This 2-hour interactive course uses an immersive, role-based simulation to deepen participants' understanding of the barriers faced by individuals experiencing intimate partner violence (IPV), with particular attention to Veteran survivors. Participants assume the role of a Veteran survivor and navigate a sequence of realistic scenarios—drawn from lived experience—that require decisions about staying, leaving, and seeking help under conditions of limited financial resources, control, and isolation. The exercise illustrates contemporary dynamics of abuse, including economic control, technology-facilitated surveillance and stalking, weaponization of a survivor's service-connected condition, and the complex roles that systems such as the VA, courts, child protective services, law enforcement, and faith communities can play in either supporting or unintentionally increasing risk. Through a structured, trauma-informed debrief, participants examine the nonlinear reality of leaving and returning, identify how personal and systemic barriers shape survivor decision-making, and consider practical implications for their own professional response. The course is appropriate for law enforcement officers, victim advocates, social workers, and allied professionals, and emphasizes voluntary participation, participant safety, and containment throughout.
Location
Hard Rock Casino
Catoosa
State: OK
Catoosa
State: OK
Start Time
09-24-2026 08:00 AM
End Time
09-24-2026 05:00 PM
Course Information:
Cost: Free
Hours: 2
Contact Information:
Contact: Kuma Kennedy, LMFT
Email: kuma.kennedy@va.gov
Phone: 918-384-4555
Last Modified on
Jul 20, 2026
