Sexual Health Training

Jill Farris, MPH, is the Director of Sexual Health Training and Education at the Healthy Youth Development - Prevention Research Center. With more than a decade of experience providing training and professional development, along with being certified in more than a dozen evidence-based programs, Farris is a sought after consultant, educator, and trainer. She is also well versed in providing capacity-building assistance to professionals who are implementing evidence-based practices and working with youth in a variety of settings - clinics, schools, foster care, juvenile justice, faith communities, and more. Farris is regarded as a national expert on fidelity, adaptation, and implementation of evidence-based sexual health programs for youth. 

 HYD - PRC provides interactive, skills-building trainings to increase the capacity of youth serving professionals and organizations. As a complement to trainings, customized assistance is also available to support program selection, implementation, and evaluation.

Evidence-Based Teen Pregnancy, HIV, and STI Prevention Programs

All4You! & All4You2!
Be Proud Be Responsible
Be Proud! Be Responsible! Be Protective!
Becoming a Responsible Teen (BART)
¡Cuidate!
Draw the Line, Respect the Line
Making a Difference
Making Proud Choices
Making Proud Choices! An Adaptation for Youth in Out-of-Home Care
Prime Time
Promoting Health Among Teens - Abstinence-only
Promoting Health Among Teens - Comprehensive
Reducing the Risk
Safer Choices
Safer Sex Intervention
Seventeen Days
SHARP (Sexual Health and Adolescent Risk Behavior)
Teen Outreach Program

Evidence-Informed Teen Pregnancy, HIV, and STI Prevention Programs

Encuentro
FLASH (Family Life and Sexual Health) Training of Educators (TOE)
3Rs - Rights, Respect, Responsibility: A K-12 Sexuality Education Curriculum

Adolescent Sexual Health Promotion

HYD - PRC promotes the sexual health of young people by strengthening the capacity of youth-serving organizations and focusing youth programs on results.

Answering Sensitive Questions: Creating a Safe Space for Youth
Becoming "Teenwise" 101
Becoming an Askable Adult
Best Practices in Sexuality Education: Skills for Non-Sex Educators
Don't Forget the Basics! - Teaching Anatomy & Puberty
It's That Easy
Sex Positive Abstinence Education: NOT an Oxymoron
The State of Adolescent Sexual Health in Minnesota

Foundations: Core Skills Training for Sex Ed

Foundations aims to ensure that educators are equipped with the skills needed to effectively facilitate student learning, create safe and inclusive classroom environments and provide opportunities for meaningful skill-building and values exploration, regardless of the specific curriculum they teach. 

Creating a Safe and Inclusive Classroom Environment
Effectively Facilitate Student Learning
Values Exploration, Self-Disclosure & Answering Sensitive Questions
Additional half day trainings that can be added to the above trainings:
Facilitation Skills for Common Sex Education Strategies
Cultural Proficiency in Sex Education
LGBTQ Inclusive Sex Education
A Trauma-Informed Approach to Sex Education

Program Planning, Implementation, and Evaluation

Conducting a Community Needs Assessment
CQI/Program Sustainability
Developing a Logic Model
Getting to Outcomes: A Step-by-Step Process to Prevent Adolescent Pregnancy
How Effective is My Work? - Evaluating Sexual Health Programs
Recipe for Success: Insight into Program Fidelity and Adaptation
 

Evidence-Based Teen Pregnancy, HIV, and STI Prevention Programs

Be Proud! Be Responsible! - This 6-module curriculum provides adolescents with knowledge, motivation, and skills necessary to change their behaviors in ways that will reduce their risk of contracting HIV/STIs.

Becoming a Responsible Teen - Designed for African American youth ages 14-18, this curriculum teaches skills to reduce sexual risk-taking.  These include correct condom use, assertive communication, refusal techniques, self-management, and problem solving.  It consists of eight sessions, 1.5 to 2 hours each, taught in community-based settings. 

¡Cuídate! - Designed for Latino youth ages 13-18, this curriculum emphasizes waiting to have sex and condom use while highlighting cultural values that support safer sex, and reframes cultural values that are perceived as barriers to safer sex.

Making a Difference! - The goal of this program is to empower middle school youth to postpone sexual activity and emphasizes that practicing abstinence is the only way to eliminate the risk for pregnancy and STI/HIV.

Making Proud Choices! - This eight-module curriculum, designed for middle school youth, emphasizes waiting to have sex or using condoms if young people do have sex.

Making Proud Choices! An Adaptation for Youth in Out-of-Home Care - This curriculum is designed to empower in-care adolescents with greater knowledge and self-respect that will encourage them to protect themselves against unintended pregnancies and STI/HIV.  The curriculum is delivered through a trauma-informed framework, to address the multiple traumas that young people in-care may have experienced. 

Prime Time - Prime Time is an 18-month youth development program designed to prevent early pregnancy among vulnerable teens. Prime Time contributes one-on-one case management and peer educator group sessions, delivered in tandem.

Promoting Health Among Teens (Abstinence & Comprehensive Versions) - In this curriculum, students learn about puberty, STI/HIV, and pregnancy prevention.  It is very interactive and student-centric. The program also includes DVDs, exercises, and games that make learning enjoyable.  PHAT-AO has 8 modules, while PHAT-C has 12.

Reducing Risk - RTR is a 16-week curriculum designed to help high school students delay the initiation of sex or increase the use of protection against pregnancy and STI/HIV if they choose to have sex. This research-proven approach addresses skills such as risk assessment, communication, decision making, planning, refusal strategies and delay tactics. 

Safer Choices - This curriculum is taught in grades 9 and 10.  Safer Choices involves teachers, parents, and community members to have a positive influence on adolescents' decisions regarding sex and help them feel supported in making healthy choices.

Safer Sex Intervention - Safer Sex Intervention is an individualized STI intervention program aimed at sexually active young women.  The overall goals are to reduce high-risk sexual behaviors, increase condom use and prevent the recurrence of STIs.  The program is appropriate for use in clinics or community based organizations led by a female health educator. 

Seventeen Days - This program is a theory-based interactive DVD designed to educate young women about contraception and STDs.  The DVD presents the viewer with different scenarios involving decisions that young women face in relationships. Participants can practice what they would do in similar situations through the frequent use of "cognitive rehearsal." 

SHARP - Sexual health and Adolescent Risk Prevention (SHARP) is designed to reduce sexual risk behaviors among adolescents in juvenile detention centers.  The intervention aims to increase condom use and reduce alcohol-related sexual behaviors among participants. Designed as a 3-4 hour, one-time intervention, the program consists of a learning component followed by a group discussion. 

Teen Outreach Program - Designed for youth ages 12-19, this program incorporates a strong service-learning component based on principles of youth development to prevent adolescent pregnancy and help youth succeed in school. 

Evidence-Informed Teen Pregnancy, HIV, and STI Prevention Programs

Encuentro - Designed for Latino youth ages 11-14 years and their parents, this curriculum aims to promote young teens' positive development, healthy sexual decision making, and healthy sexual behaviors. The curriculum includes four units: cultural identity, practices, and pride; positive family connectedness and teen-parent communication; puberty and sexuality education; and youth life skills. 

FLASH (Family Life and Sexual Health) - FLASH is a widely used comprehensive sexuality education curriculum developed by Public Health Seattle-King County and designed to prevent teen pregnancy, STDs, and sexual violence.  FLASH is available for elementary, middle school, high school, and special education classrooms.

3Rs - Rights, Respect, Responsibility: A K-12 Sexuality Education Currciulum - This K-12 curriculum is a collection of lesson plans on a wide range of topics including: self-understanding, family, growth and development, friendship, sexuality, life skills, and health promotion.

Adolescent Sexual Health Promotion

Answering Sensitive Questions: Creating a Safe Space for Youth - Participants learn best practices for answering sensitive questions, gain the confidence necessary to handle questions that arise, and in so doing, increase their ability to create a safe, open and effective learning environment for youth.

Becoming "Teenwise" 101 - Participants review pregnancy, birth, and STI statistics; trends in adolescent pregnancy and sexual behaviors; basics of adolescent growth and development; risk and protective factors associated with adolescent pregnancy; and prevention strategies that work. 

Becoming an Askable Adult - This training is intended for adults who work with youth, to give them skills to become an open and "askable" presence in young people's lives.  The workshop covers general information about adolescent sexual health, legal information (mandatory reporting, minor's consent, etc.), values clarification, and how to answer difficult questions.

Best Practices in Sexuality Education: Skills for Non-Sex Educators - This interactive workshop covers best practices in teaching about birth control and condoms, answering sensitive questions and the latest information on STIs.  The training will also help participants examine their own values about sex and sexuality, understand what the new national sexuality education standards mean for their work and how to teach this information to youth.

Don't Forget the Basics! - Teaching Anatomy & Puberty - Many sexuality education programs focus on birth control, STIs, and communication skills, but assure that students already have basic knowledge of puberty and anatomy...but that if they don't? This creative and interactive workshop is focused on developing fun and engaging presentations on sex ed fundamentals. 

It's That Easy - The training, for professionals who work with parents/caregivers of children aged birth to 18, demonstrates tools and techniques to engage parents in developmentally appropriate approaches to raising sexually healthy children.  Participants receive the It's That Easy manual, a comprehensive guide for work with parents. 

Sex Positive Abstinence Education: NOT an Oxymoron - Professionals in adolescent health agree - we want young people to practice abstinence.  However, even the word abstinence is a loaded term, and many abstinence messages conveyed to youth have a judgmental element that disparages youth who do have sex.  In this interactive workshop, participants will examine their personal values about abstinence, identify both positive and negative abstinence messages conveyed to youth, and practice turning negative abstinence messages into positive sexual health messages for young people. 

The State of Adolescent Sexual Health in Minnesota - Participants review the most current statistics on the sexual health of Minnesota youth, including pregnancy, birth, and STI statistics, trends in adolescent pregnancy and sexual behaviors, and how Minnesota measures up regionally and nationally.

Program Planning, Implementation, and Evaluation

Conducting a Community Needs Assessment - Participants will understand how to better assess the populations they serve, including examining cultural values and norms, in order to better select, adapt, and implement evidence-based adolescent pregnancy, HIV/STI prevention programs.

CQI/Program Sustainability - Participants learn how to conduct Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) to strengthen their programs and plan for program sustainability.  Participants will describe how CQI leads to program sustainability and develop a program sustainability action plan.

Developing a Logic Model - Participants will understand how to develop logic models to design and use programs to prevent adolescent pregnancy and HIV/STI.  Participants apply the concepts of risk and protective factors to build their own logic models.

Getting to Outcomes: A Step-by-Step Process to Prevent Adolescent Pregnancy - Participants are guided through the Getting to Outcomes (GTO) framework, a process that helps practitioners use an evidence-based approach to plan, implement, evaluate, and improve programs.  GTO connects these essential ingredients for effective prevention programs. 

How Effective is My Work? - Evaluating Sexual Health Programs - Participants will understand the basics of process and outcome evaluation, learn about basic evaluation instruments, and leave with a plan to implement and analyze these tools in their settings.

Recipe for Success: Insight into Program Fidelity and Adaptation - Participants will learn about practical tools and resources to guide them in maintaining fidelity to core components of evidence-based interventions and make effective adaptations, and will come to understand why funders and decision-makers stress fidelity.

 

 

Jill Farris

Jill Farris, MPH, Director of Sexual Health Training and Education

Contact Us

For more information, contact us: 
612-626-7952 or
[email protected]