PUBLIC EDUCATION
Finding Our Voices is moving the needle on domestic abuse in Maine with bold survivor-led Public Education. Through innovative campaigns, we:
1) Alert all about the public health emergency of domestic abuse in our State, and what needs to change.
2) Erase harmful stereotypes and misplaced shame and stigma.
3) Help prevent domestic abuse with our work in schools, getting students talking and thinking—and then educating their peers—about what is love and what is not love and the behaviors that have become normalized and are NOT OK.
Survivor-Powered
Posters
This groundbreaking, award-winning campaign features 48 named Maine women survivors aged 18 to 85, standing proud and speaking loud to smash harmful stereotypes, alert all to the complexity and ubiquity of domestic abuse, and give hope and help to our sisters.
Click here to see all 24 of the posters. Get in touch to help us these powerful messages of hope and help to your Maine town.
Bookmarks
Our bookmarks are scaled-down and pocket-size versions of the posters, distributed in public libraries and bookstores and food pantries across Maine. Thank you to First National Bank for sponsoring this project two years in a row.
News Story HERE !
Sadie of Brooklin's public library and three of the survivors who just gave a panel presentation at this library, and are featured on the bookmarks they hold, Mary Lou Smith, Christine Buckley, and Finding Our Voices CEO +Founder Patrisha McLean.
Alan Kearl, director of AIO Food Pantry, with Mary Lou Smith holding up her personalized bookmark. AIO is one of the many social service agencies across Maine distributing the Finding Our Voices bookmarks to their clients.
Let’s Talk About It Tour
Our "Let's Talk About It Tour" launched in October 2023 when the Scarborough Public Library hosted our Survivor-Speaks panel discussion. Since then, domestic abuse survivors have shared their stories to more than 50 communities across Maine from York to Millinocket and including a tour of remote islands with the Seacoast Mission.
Our Men Talking event with three men sharing the impact of growing up with violent fathers broke indoor attendance records at the Camden Public Library.
Get in touch to help bring us to YOUR town in 2026!
Bath, May 2025
Maine Irish Heritage Center, October 2024
Camden Public Library, November 2023
Public Rallies
Finding Our Voices is getting louder by the day about the outrages around domestic violence including bailing out and releasing early from prison and jail the most dangerous members of our society. Look for us and join us in a Maine downtown near YOU!
Mother's Day Weekend in Brunswick
Nicole Bernhardt at the State House, Augusta
Protesting Rep. Lucas Lanigan (R. Sanford) remaining a legislator after being indicted on charges of strangling his wife.
Watch the News Story here.
Youth Outreach
Finding Our Voices is working with Maine high school and middle school students to identify unhealthy dating patterns and then create posters to educate their peers about what they now know. Please contact us here if you can help bring us to a school in YOUR town in 2026.
"The Finding Our Voices project started a lot of great conversations with my students. We were even able to keep referring back to it during our Relationships Lesson towards the end of the semester as we discussed consent and boundary setting.” — Stephanie Gabriner, Health Teacher at Biddeford High School
Our anonymous surveys filled out by Maine high school students reveal the dating abuse that our young people are experiencing now.
With our Pop-Culture Wheel Project, students critically examine the popular culture they consume and identify unhealthy dating behaviors.
Faye and Tucker with the Pop Culture-Wheel they created based on dysfunction they observed with Dean and Rory from The Gilmore Girls.
Other Creative Ways We Are Opening Eyes, Minds, Hearts to the Domestic Abuse All Around Us
Patrisha's conversations with domestic abuse survivors airs as a radio show and Podcast. She and Mary Lou Smith host an online Book Club featuring conversations with authors about the domestic abuse in their books.
We love it when community members marshal their skills and talents to shine a light on domestic abuse for Finding Our Voices.
Resa Randolph did this masterfully for us, across four radio episodes exploring 100 years of misogyny through the Great American Songbook. Listen to the shocking, infuriating songs that are in the heads and hearts of generations of Americans, and no doubt helped sow our domestic abuse crisis.