info@impactchicago.org
        773-561-9000

ABOUT IMPACT CHICAGO


 
 











 
 
 
 
 


“It's like 50 pounds of fear have been taken off my shoulders. Thinking about my future now fills me with excitement instead of anxiety."      --  Ellen

 
 

  



 


“IMPACT has been more than just a self-defense course. It gives women the tools to protect themselves as well as the mental strength to maintain empowerment in everyday life."    --  Janet


 

IMPACT’s Mission
IMPACT Chicago is committed to ending violence and building a non-violent world in which all people can live safely and with dignity. By teaching self-defense, we provide women and girls with the tools they need to prevent, minimize, and stop violence. With that, IMPACT Chicago is committed to making its programs accessible to people of all economic, racial/ethnic, and social groups. IMPACT Chicago encourages the personal growth of people within the organization and supports their creative efforts to end violence and build a non-violent world.

IMPACT is based on an understanding of violence, particularly gender-based violence, as a widespread social problem perpetuated by imbalances of power and disrespect for others. There is an understanding that intersections of gender, race, class, sexuality, age, national origin, and (dis)ability affect how an individual may be targeted and respond to violence. For more information about the IMPACT Chicago approach to self-defense, listen to the "Your Chicago" interview (Episode 5) with Martha Thompson, then Director: www.yourchicagopodcast.com.

Our key values are that both individuals and communities are responsible for safety and violence prevention. We believe that women and girls are powerful and have the right to control their own bodies and set boundaries. We also believe that men are and can be allies. We implement out mission by creating female-male teams led by female instructors. We work with diverse groups of people--across gender, race, class, sexuality, age, and physical abilities--and create classroom environments in which people learn individually and collectively. We serve women and girls (including transgendered people identifying as female). We do outreach in various communities, offer financial assistance to individuals, and offer workshops for organizations serving low-income groups. For more about the IMPACT Chicago mission, see our Executive Summary.

The IMPACT Organization
Strike to the groinIMPACT Chicago, founded in 1987, is a not-for-profit organization, governed by a volunteer Board of Directors and an Administrative Team.

2013 IMPACT Chicago Board of Directors

Lisa Amoroso, Chair
Rob Babcock, Secretary
Katie Skibbe, Treasurer
Debborah Harp
Katie Kramer
Martha Thompson

IMPACT Chicago Administrative Team 2013

Lisa Amoroso, Annual Fund Drive, Project Team Coordinator, Systems Support
Rob Babcock, Board-Instructor Liaison
Leslie Eto, Office Coordinator, Registration and Workshop Director
Deb Mier, Rogers Park Project Team Lead
Molly Norris, West Town Project Team Lead
Jennifer Norton, Volunteer Outreach
AC Racette, Assistant Director and North Center Project Team Lead
Arden Schumann, Social Media Technical Coordinator
Katie Skibbe, Financial Management
Martha Thompson, Program Coordinator, Social Media Content Coordinator
Nat Wilson, Systems Support
Amy Winston, Webmaster

We are a nimble organization. We are mission-driven with clear, manageable goals. We are efficient, effective, and selective (meaning we minimize work that does not clearly push our mission forward or is not required for fiscal solvency). Our mission and programming are at the center of our work; our organizational structure spreads out responsibility for work required to keep our mission and programming going across three key groups: Board/Committees, Instructors, and Administration. For information about IMPACT Chicago accomplishments, finances, and privacy policy, please see the IMPACT Chicago Annual Report, IRS 990, balance sheet, budget, and privacy policy.

IMPACT Chicago is part of the national and international IMPACT community, which has yearly Director meetings and regular e-mail communications about teaching self-defense, maintaining high professional and ethical standards, doing outreach, and discussing other issues related to self-defense and organizational development. Additional information about IMPACT International can be found here

IMPACT programs provide women and girls with an opportunity to learn and practice prevention, assessment, verbal boundary setting, and physical self-defense skills in simulated scenarios with a padded attacker. The physical fighting skills women learn are skills of last resort, but many women report that learning to knock someone out opens up possibilities and confidence in making peaceful choices for dealing with violence as well as simultaneously enhancing freedom and safety. 

IMPACT Chicago’s programs are taught by highly trained instructors. Additional information about our instructors is available on our IMPACT Instructors page.

For additional information about IMPACT Chicago’s organization or mission, e-mail info@impactchicago.org or call 773-561-9000.

Research and Statistics
Newspapers and television continually bombard us with stories and statistics that bespeak terror and fear:

  •  Almost one-third of women in the workplace and 85% of girls in school report harassment (Louis Harris and Associates Poll, March 1994 and American Association of University Women, Hostile Hallways: AAUW Survey on Sexual Harassment in America's Schools, 1993).
  • At some point in their lives, 25-31% of American women report being physically or sexually abused by a husband or boyfriend (The Commonwealth Fund, Health Concerns Across a Woman's Life Span: 1998 Survey of Women's Health, May 1999; The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and The National Institute of Justice, Extent, Nature, and Consequences of Intimate Partner Violence, July 2000).
  • About one-fifth of American women report experiencing a completed or attempted rape at some time in their lives (The Commonwealth Fund, Health Concerns Across a Woman's Life Span: 1998 Survey of Women's Health, May 1999; The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and The National Institute of Justice, Prevalence, Incidence, and Consequences of Violence Against Women: Findings from the National Violence Against Women Survey, November 1998).
Fortunately, there is more to these stories. Women do fight back to protect themselves. 

  •  A woman who fights back gains an 86% chance of avoiding the rape and incurs little chance of additional injury. Most injuries occur before the woman starts fighting back. Women are most likely to stop an attack if they act immediately and use multiple strategies, such as yelling, fleeing, negotiating, or fighting (Kleck and Sayles, "Rape and Resistance," Social Problems 1990, 37:149-62; Bart & O'Brien, Stopping Rape, 1985).
Scholarly research shows that women who complete IMPACT-type programs report increased self-confidence and awareness as well as acquisition of a wide range of verbal and physical self-defense skills applicable to many real-life situations:

  •  Women who have completed IMPACT/Model Mugging report increased ability to set boundaries, increased self-confidence, and greater freedom in their everyday lives (Ozer and Bandura, "Mechanisms Governing Empowerment Effects: A Self-Efficacy Analysis," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1990).
  • Of women trained in self-defense with a padded attacker and who were attacked after the training, 56% knocked-out or disabled their attacker, 34% escaped from their attacker or he ran away, 6% lost property, and 4% submitted to a rape because in their judgment it was the safest choice (Mark Morris, unpublished study of 50 Model Mugging graduates).
  • Eight hundred girls have completed IMPACT at Santa Catalina School since 1987. Of these 800, 15 have reported an attack since taking the course. All used verbal and/or physical tools and got away or the assailant fled (Dean's Report, Santa Catalina School).
  • Twenty-two women who completed IMPACT were contacted for follow-up after completing a course. Of these women, 20% reported using physical skills against attempted assaults of various kinds within 3-3 1/2  years since they took the course; an additional 35% reported using verbal and interpersonal skills to prevent or manage threats. Over 60% reported a wide range of positive ways the training had affected their lives and how they managed perceived threats or dangers from purse snatchings to interpersonal violence (Richard Chipping, London Centre for Personal Safety).
In her book, Real Knockouts, Martha McCaughey writes, "Padded attacker courses offer women a chance to experience full-force fighting, as these self-defense instructors believe that most successful assaults occur not because women aren't strong enough to fight men but because women facing an assailant often freeze up rather than fight. Because the 'muggers' attack the students at full force...women...learn their defense techniques while their adrenaline level is high and their fine motor skills low, thus committing the skills to 'bodily memory,' which will automatically be triggered in the course of an attack." 

IMPACT works.


 
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