Thank you to our volunteers

We want to thank all of our volunteers who we could not do the work that we do at WRASAC 

All of our board members are volunteers and commit their time and skills to helping make sure that WRASAC continues to deliver a service in Dundee & Angus

Feedback from some of our board 

"I have had the honour of serving as a trustee on the board of WRASAC for just over two years, focusing on HR support. I joined WRASAC because I am passionate about using my time to give back to a feminist organisation whose values align with my own. Volunteering is incredibly important to me, as it enables me to support not only the organisation but also the amazing women who work tirelessly to deliver these critical services. In the future, I would obviously like to see an end to gender-based violence, but shorter-term I hope to see significantly increased political focus on acknowledging and tackling the misogyny that is so inherent in our society"

"In the year since I joined the board it has been such a pleasure working with all of the other board members and staff. I already knew of the great work the team did, but have been continuously impressed and encouraged to see the good work going on to support women in Dundee & Angus when they need it most. This is my first board position and the experience has been so positive and rewarding and I would highly recommend others consider volunteering for a cause that's important to them. I dream about the day when GBV is stopped and we finally get real gender equality. I want girls today to grow up in a world where they are afforded every opportunity. No matter where and which gender they were born."

WRASAC TURNS 40

WRASAC has been running now for 40 years and this year we plan to fundraise £40k + to help continue the work we do in supporting women and young people who have been impacted and experienced sexual violence. 

We have launched our 40th birthday on 5/6/24 at the Dundee Women's Hub where we held a garden party (where the weather allowed us to).

We will have a range of different events on during this next year and we will keep you posted about these on our social media platforms. 

Our LGBTQI+ Scotland Chartermark Journey

We have recently been working alongside LGBTQI+ Scotland to achieve our silver Chartermark award and we wanted to give you a little insight into the work we have done over the past year. Once we successfully achieved our Bronze Chartermark, we felt it was important to continue our journey to inclusivity. We embarked on our silver award and wanted to ensure we tackled each area thoroughly, consulting with the LGBTQI+ community and looking at how our service can become more inclusive.

We began by reaching out to local LGBTQI+ organisations and charities to discuss meeting them and coming together to discuss the challenges faced by the community, so we had a better understanding of the areas where change was needed. We met with Dundee Pride and attended the Coldside Picnic where we had the opportunity to introduce our organisation and have some important conversations regarding barriers to support and the prevalence of sexual violence amongst the LGBTQI+ community. Here we were able to make more connections with other organisations such as the police youth volunteers, Terrance Higgins Trust, Men only Tayside and local councillors. This enabled us to continue to build our partnerships and relationships with other organisations within Dundee.

We then hosted an event within the Overgate where we had a range of organisations showcase the services available to the LGBTQI+ community, we worked alongside The Corner, Dundee Pride, Terrance Higgins Trust, Police Tayside, and NHS. This was an opportunity for members of the LGBTQI+ community to come and find out what support is available, make connections and find out more about how we plan to combat the barriers that are presented when accessing support. 

Working in partnership across these events allowed us to engage with the LGBTQI+ community and get a better understanding of how we could become more inclusive and the real impact of sexual violence in LGBTQI+ relationships. To honour those who had been impacted by sexual violence we worked alongside other key organisations in facilitating the first Transgender Day of Remembrance Vigil, this took place in the grounds of Dundee University and allowed a safe space for individuals to gather, find comfort with each other and remember those we had lost. This was also an important opportunity to show solidarity and unity across the sexual violence sector. We have since hosted our second annual Trans Vigil which was another successful event. This event is now something we hope to help organise each year alongside other LGBTQI+ organisations.

Due to working so closely with Dundee Pride we were invited to have a stall at the 2023 Dundee Pride where we were able to showcase our service and meet with attendees of Pride. This enabled us to have important conversations about the accessibility of our service and the barriers presented when accessing support for sexual violence. It was mentioned that some attendee’s did not know they could access support from us however felt more reassured knowing they could seek support if needed. We engaged with a lot of people and felt this was a successful experience. We also worked alongside Dundee Women’s Aid to facilitate a workshop on healthy boundaries in LGBTQI+ relationships within this event.

Shortly after our attendance at Dundee Pride we were asked by Trans Pride Scotland to attend their event, here we held a stall as with Dundee pride and were able to meet and talk with those that attended, this gave us a great opportunity to further showcase our service and raise awareness of sexual violence. We had great conversations with people from all over Scotland which gave us a better understanding of issues that are faced across the country and how this relates locally.

These are just a few of the events and engagements we have taken part in throughout our time working on the Chartermark award. We have been fortunate to build great relationships and strong partnerships within the LGBTQI+ community which has allowed us to consult on our service and gain valuable insight. This has resulted in us making some changes in the way we work, furthering our knowledge and even considering the name of our organisation and the barrier this presents.

We are looking forward to continuing on our journey to achieve our Gold award in 2024, we are keen to imbed this learning and knowledge within our organisation and continue to educate ourselves on the many issues faced by the LGBTQI+ community, ensuring we become part of the solution.