October 17, 2026
For the past 10 years, Be the Peace Institute has worked alongside survivors, community organizations, researchers, advocates, and government partners to help build safer, more equitable, and more peaceful communities free from gender-based violence.
April 7-8 2025
Be the Peace Institute and many collaborators hosted a 2-day GBV Summit thanks to funding from Status of Women NS. In follow up to our first IWD Summit and to share back on action and progress over the year via our 8 and growing working groups, we hosted over 160 diverse folks from across the sector to continue strategic conversations and innovate to address this epidemic from all vantage points.
January 2024 - May 2024
Be the Peace Institute, in partnership with Women’s Centres Connect and with funding from NS Status of Women, is pleased to share this synthesis of recent GBV-related reports: : A Synthesis of Action Plans for Ending Gender-Based Violence & Promoting Equity in Nova Scotia.
April 2, 2024 - November 1, 2025
This project is funded by the NS Status of Women Office to follow up on the IWD Summit in March of 2024 where over 150 people with a stake in preventing and ending gender-based violence (GBV) across sectors in Nova Scotia explored moving forward in some new, innovative ways. Since then, several working groups have developed on specific topics identified as priorities in the intersection of GBV prevention and response.
March 6th & 7th, 2024
Be the Peace Institute and Leeside Society were proud to host 150 participants from across the GBV and related sectors, for an immersive 2-day gathering to understand, reflect, and strategize on preventing and ending gender-based violence, and the quest for gender intersectional equity and justice in Nova Scotia. Click the link below for more information, photos and outcomes from our event.
October 18 & 19, 2023
Our Why Here? Why Now? Why Me? conference among 93 GBV service providers to connect the dots in law reform, intimate partner violence and the Mass Casualty Commission recommendations was an amazing collaboration between three organizations and a inspiration for the work ahead.
January 2023 - March 2024
The “PIC” project will explore the feasibility of establishing a Gender-based Violence (GBV) Innovation Lab in Nova Scotia with multi-sector partners across traditional silos, to serve as an infrastructure to mobilize emergent research and lived expertise of diverse populations; compel collaborative learning and collective evidence-based advocacy and impact; and to activate innovative solutions aimed at the root causes of GBV for systems level change in institutional structures, culture and social narrative.
May 18th, 2023
With funding from Justice Canada PCVI for Victims and Survivours of Crime Week (May 14th -20th, 2023), Be the Peace Institute and partners convened an event for sharing of survivor-centred research on gender-based violence (GBV) in Nova Scotia. This collaboration included the voices of people with lived expertise in academic/community partnered research to bring their direct voices to the fore to raise awareness of the issues facing victims and survivors of crime ‘in their own words’ as they search for accountability, healing and justice after GBV.
April 2021 - April 2024
The No Longer on My Own (NOLOMO) project is a research project designed to understand the access to justice barriers and challenges facing survivors of family violence within the justice system in Nova Scotia. Be the Peace Institute is part of the project team and advisory committee.
April 2019 – April 2021
My Voice Matters is a project to expand and coordinate services to women receiving interest-free micro-loans that help women to escape abusive relationships. Interviews with loan recipients informed understanding on how the loans are impacted their lives, their safety and perspectives on preventing domestic violence.
November 2019
This two-day summit gathered diverse women to take stock of where we are in terms of gender equity/ justice in Nova Scotia, to acknowledge the progress made in successive waves of women’s movements, to inform how we understand the current terrain, and to envision and activate paths forward in strategic ways together.
June 2020 - March 2022
The Learning Lab bridges the fields of gender-based violence and justice with systems change leadership to forge deeper relationships with others through exploration of the complex dynamics affecting gender-based violence in NS.
January 2019 – January 2020
Sexual Assault Services Lunenburg Queens (SASLQ) is a collaborative community partnership developed to create a comprehensive sexual assault response. This project helped to “bridge the gaps” in sexual assault services and protocols after a shift to a provincial response model.
January 2018 — April 2019
In the twenty years since this conversation began, a broad grouping of community organizations advocating for victims and those offering restorative approaches have worked together to support better justice for victims of gendered violence.
April 2019 - April 2024
This four-year project will grow our influence on gender equity and addressing gendered violence in our communities. By improving our advocacy, we hope to take new steps to ensure our ongoing financial viability and bring new analysis to complex issues and to make a difference for women and survivors.
March - October 2018
The 3-part series was an opportunity to learn from experts in the field and from youth —to uncover, explore, and strategize being responsible digital citizens and the impact of socialized gender norms on relationships on and offline.
August 2018 - August 2021
This cross-sectional study includes the perspectives of police, Crown Prosecutors, allied professionals, perpetrators and survivors of domestic violence in studying the efficacy of pro-arrest, -prosecution and -charge policies intended to address domestic violence.
April 2017 - May 2018
In facilitated kitchen table conversations, diverse groups of parents explored how to raise confident, empowered, authentic children, and how pressure to conform to gender constructs shapes their parenting and their children’s social relationships.
May 2018 - December 2021
Researchers will gather stories of gender-based violence and engage survivors to inform needed change. This project will uncover key justice values required for fair outcomes and survivor-defined justice to inform needed system change.
January 2017 - April 2021
The traditional criminal justice system has failed women in significant ways. Is there a better way? Can the use of a restorative and trauma-informed lens be helpful? How could intersectional analysis leverage women’s leadership for better process and outcomes?
