Workshop
Request
CAE works within a range of settings to deliver the principles & tools of Empowerment Self-Defense and Upstander content. Click below to submit a request and we will follow up with a conversation to help build a workshop that meets the needs of your community.
Workshop Menu
Our workshops equip participants with a range of tools to stay safer, including verbal de-escalation, active bystander intervention, and physical blocks and strikes.
Schedule
Please provide us with a minimum of 4 weeks advance notice for your requested workshop date. We offer both one-time and series workshops.
Pricing
Many N.Y.C. nonprofits, public schools, and community-based organizations qualify for free workshops. Custom workshops are available to companies and for-profit entities with sliding scale fees.
Location
The majority of our workshops are conducted over Zoom. We consider requests for in-person programming on a case-by-case basis. We encourage you to read our in-person COVID safety guidelines.
Workshop Menu
Workshop Menu
Empowerment Self Defense Workshops
These workshops help adults at risk of violence build physical, verbal, and socio-emotional tools to stay safer.
Empowerment Self
Defense 101
This introductory physical self-defense training teaches fundamental blocks and strikes to get away safely. Participants learn practical ways to manage distance while using footwork and complete exercises and drills to improve muscle memory when responding to sudden physical attacks.
Staying Safer
This two-part self-defense training is for adults who want to learn nonviolent communication (NVC) and de-escalation strategies, particularly when addressing violence and tension in the home. Participants have an opportunity to examine common communication practices that fuel conflict across power dynamics.
Hold Your Ground
This three-part series, which includes both discussion and physical practice, focuses on sexual violence and the different ways it impacts our lives. It explores boundary setting, consent, healthy & unhealthy relationship dynamics, and avenues for domestic violence support while also covering essential physical skills for potentially life threatening situations.
Right To Be Safe
This training teaches adults Upstander tools to help disrupt scapegoating and xenophobic acts and rhetoric. Participants also practice physical self-defense techniques to get away safely, including fundamental blocks and strikes
This workshop can be tailored to different audiences. Past workshops have focused on the legacy and recent surge of anti-Asian hate violence as well as the history of anti-Semitism in the United States and the ongoing attacks targeting Jewish people.
De-escalation & Safety
This training helps adults recognize the continuum of stress, which has the potential to result in crisis and violence. Participants examine how intersectional identities -- including gender, race, and body size -- shape how to de-escalate situations. Through scenarios and role playing, participants practice setting clear boundaries and using concrete de-escalation skills at their own pace and comfort level.
Responding to Weapons
Threats
This three-part series, which includes both discussion and physical practice, focuses on sexual violence and the different ways it impacts our lives. It explores boundary setting, consent, healthy & unhealthy relationship dynamics, and avenues for domestic violence support while also covering essential physical skills for potentially life threatening situations.
Public Transit Safety Series
Public transit is an essential part of many lives. This curriculum includes verbal de-escalation strategies as well as physical techniques to help folks get away safely and help others stay safe.
There are five workshops in this series. These can be taken individually or as a series.
Upstander Workshops
These workshops teach adults concrete tools to de-escalate and disrupt violence against others.
Upstander 101:
Allyship is an Action
This workshop is for adults who want to learn interpersonal tools to more safely intervene in violence against others. Participants practice active bystander intervention techniques that center the needs of the person(s) being targeted, with the ultimate goal of preventing, disrupting, and helping heal from hate, harassment, and violence.
This workshop explores the range of possibilities for small or large community action to interrupt oppression institutionally and interpersonally while leading with dignity, compassion, and love. Participants examine their strengths, relationships, and resources, and how to apply them towards building beloved communities.
Responding to
Microaggressions in the
Workplace
This training is for adults who want to learn communication strategies to disrupt microaggressions in the workplace and beyond. Participants examine the oppressive legacies that undergird microaggressions and practice calling-in strategies to interrupt them, with the goal of shifting workplace culture.
Upstander 201:
Building Beloved
Community
Creating a Culture of
Consent
In this interactive workshop, participants learn to apply active bystander intervention strategies to disrupt real life scenarios of gender based violence and sexual violence. Participants discuss consent and how to create a culture of respect for people’s boundaries, and offer concrete tools to intervene and prevent gender based violence and sexual violence in everyday life - from the subway, to the sidewalk.
Squad Goals
In this workshop, participants will learn more about the history of queer and trans people - both their joy and their continued resistance in the face of targeted violence, from the Stonewall Riots to the Stonewall Protests. There will be interactive discussions around the differences between gender identity, gender expression, and sexuality, and the roots of transphobic oppression.
Responding to
Xenophobia
This workshop addresses the ways that xenophobia and scapegoating since the COVID-19 outbreak continue against Asian communities. Participants will look at the dangerous history of xenophobia in the United States against a cross-section of groups, and the ways that current public narratives and interpersonal acts are making living through the pandemic even scarier and more dangerous for Asian Americans.
Across the Table
In this workshop, participants co-create strategies of care and safety for themselves and others. Participants explore the connections between oppressive ideologies, and how they show up in our institutions and relationships. Learn tools and strategies to create systems of support, and intervene when microaggressions occur.
Youth Workshops
These workshops help young people empower themselves, stay safer, and build community.
Youth Empowerment
Self Defense
In this introductory physical self defense training, young people will learn empowering ways to tap into their voices and bodies to stay safe. It will cover how to manage physical distance and use footwork as well as strikes and blocks.
Using Your Superpowers
This training will teach young people an array of interpersonal tools to identify and disrupt instances of xenophobia and anti-Blackness. It will cover safe intervention strategies and focus on how to center the needs of the person(s) being targeted.
Consent & Chill
This training will teach young people what consent is and how it applies across a range of relationships. It includes role-playing and breakout groups to unpack scenarios. The curriculum can be expanded to discuss elements of a healthy relationship.
Safer Slut Series
This series will provide interactive exercises, socio-cultural contexts, verbal and physical techniques, embodied learning experiences, and resources to allow participants to answer these questions for themselves.
Safer Slut 101:
Underpinning Agency
In this workshop, participants will investigate foundational considerations for safe, consensual sexual exploration as well as verbal skills for recognizing and combating sexual & gender-based violence in our daily lives. This workshop is interactive, offering educational resources while offering a space to develop practices for sexual encounters that honor the agency and safety of all involved parties.
Safer Slut 201:
Autonomous Babe
We should live in a world where everyone’s autonomy is seen and respected. While it is never your fault if someone brings violence into life, we want you to feel as empowered as possible to maintain your own sense of autonomy. In this workshop, participants will learn to apply physical self defense skills within intimate and sexual contexts. They will be given the opportunity to practice these skills in a safe, controlled environment.
Safer Slut 301:
Fierce Friendship
While sexual intimacy is often viewed as a private matter, part of maintaining healthy dynamics often necessitates other supportive relationships. In this workshop, participants will explore signs of unhealthy relationships and abuse as well as strategies to support someone who is navigating an unhealthy partnership. Participants will also explore how gender-based and sexual violence impacts our communities and ways to get involved in actively changing that.
Request a Workshop!
Interested in CAE's workshops? Fill out this form to get in touch with our team!
Who We’ve Worked With
