Print edition: 
A four-year project to help youths develop healthy relationships kicks off today at the Murdock Theatre.
The Start Strong Wichita event starts at 3:30 p.m. and includes live music from the band Feels Good. It will culminate in a march around the Historic County Courthouse to raise awareness for healthy relationships and teen dating violence prevention.
"The unique part of it is, it is teen-driven," said Nancy Carroll, violence prevention coordinator for Catholic Charities in Wichita. "Instead of adults deciding what will work for teens, it is teens deciding what will work for them."
The four-year project is funded through a $1 million grant to Catholic Charities from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
The group has been working with teen leaders in Wichita to develop tonight's event. Big Brothers Big Sisters, YMCA, Boys & Girls Club, Go Zones and other after-school programs have worked with Start Strong Wichita.
"One in three teenage girls will graduate high school having been in some kind of abusive relationship as of this year," Carroll said.
To combat that, the program plans to have training on how to handle relationships, how to avoid violence and other pitfalls young people might encounter — even how to handle interactions through texting or online sites such as the popular social networking site Facebook, which Start Strong Wichita has a page on.
"We're in a whole new era of where do you draw those boundary lines," Carroll said.
The project is also working with the Wichita school district to introduce seventh- and ninth-grade curriculum teaching students how to communicate and handle conflict, she said.
The grant programming runs though November 2012, said Catholic Charities Communication Director Teresa Kunze.
The grant covers the expenses for the outreach and other projects such as a locally developed awareness ad airing locally and online at http://tinyurl.com/ygot8hp.
More information can be found at www.startstrongwichita.org.
Other groups working with the project include Wichita Area Sexual Assault Center, the Wichita State University Department of Sociology and WSU's Center for Community Support and Research.
