Legal and Financial Literacy Project

CWLC’s Legal and Financial Literacy Project aims to free victims of domestic violence from the isolating and imprisoning economic grip of their abusers and to enable them to gain legal and financial independence. The project will provide domestic violence shelter personnel in communities across California with a toolkit and training to allow them, in turn, to educate the increasing number of women who reach out to them for help.

Title IX: Comprehensive Compliance Program

The 40th anniversary of the passage of Title IX, the federal law that prohibits schools from discriminating on the basis of sex, is fast approaching. CWLC’s Comprehensive Compliance Program will provide training, educational materials, best practices, and model policies to schools and communities regarding their compliance with Title IX on topics such as gender equity in athletics, the rights of pregnant and parenting teens, the rights of victims of dating violence, the rights of young women to be free from sexual harassment, and the promotion of young women in science and math.

Teen Dating Violence: Restraining Orders at School Initiative

Teen dating violence is a silent epidemic in California and around the country. Approximately one-third of all girls are victims of abuse in a dating relationship. One of the critical places to keep victims safe is at school. California counties, however, have divergent practices for enforcing restraining orders at school. CWLC’s Teen Dating Violence: Restraining Orders at School Initiative will study the processes of several communities, identify best practices, and provide training to judges, law enforcement personnel, and educational stakeholders to effectively enforce restraining orders at school.

Safe Access Program

Patients, their family members and allies, and health care personnel have the right to unfettered access to California’s reproductive health care facilities, free from confrontation and intimidation. CWLC’s Safe Access Program will provide legal training to municipal lawyers, district attorneys, judges, and law enforcement personnel in communities across California with a particular focus on the constitutional issues at stake for defending the rights of women seeking safe access to reproductive health care.

STEM Law Program

Women are significantly unrepresented in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields. In stark contrast to the general population, where women make up approximately 50% of the workforce, women comprise only 20% of the scientific and technical workers in the country. CWLC’s STEM Law Project aims to provide educators and policymakers with legal training, as well a protocol for ensuring that they are in compliance with Title IX, and other civil rights statutes.

Rape Reporting and Response Program

Systems for reporting rape in California are resoundingly deficient, with most cases going unreported. Rape statistics are also unreliable because they are based on the narrow FBI definition of rape, not the broader California law. CWLC’s Rape Reporting and Response Program will provide training to law enforcement personnel, district attorneys, judges, and sexual assault responders on the interaction of state and federal law, transparency in reporting incidents of rape, and awareness of the rights of rape and sexual assault victims.

Teen Alcohol Abuse Program

High rates of teen drinking combined with the proliferation of alcoholic novelty drinks and alcohol infused energy drinks pose significant threats to young women, who are too often the victims of sexual assaults and date rape. The current regulations for the sale and marketing of novelty drinks are inadequate. CWLC’s Teen Alcohol Abuse Program will advocate for reform of these regulations and will raise awareness about teen alcohol abuse in communities throughout California.

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