Community sentiment has been shifted many times before - think campaigns to wear seatbelts, the drive to cut smoking rates, the push to wear sunscreen and avoid a tan.
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Student leaders from every Ballarat secondary college gathered on June 11 for a forum to brainstorm ideas and tools on how they can help change community attitudes to domestic and gender-based violence and create a safer society for everyone.
Wearing t-shirts saying #enough, students worked through the complex issues around violence, ingrained attitudes and creating community-wide change.
Better education at younger ages around stereotypes, consistency of education, having the confidence and skills to call out unhelpful behaviour and language, and the power of building connections came through as common ground to start from.
And students felt education around gender equality had to start in primary school or even earlier - especially in Ballarat where children have been exposed to extreme levels of news surrounding violence against women this year alone.
Students from each school worked to come up with a pledge they would share at school to help open conversations with fellow school-mates.
"It's not weak to speak and we need to speak to keep the conversation open," said Phoenix P-12 Community College student Bree.
"It can come back to language being used in the school yard ... making young people aware. And the younger they are the more likely those changes are to stick in their brain. Starting the change with younger people will make it easier."
Schoolmate Charlie said starting conversations around gendered violence in children could help attitude changes "integrate through every generation.
"If it's something young people are brought up with and talking about, there's no stigma around it," she said.
Community leaders come to listen
A lunchtime session saw many of Ballarat's community leaders - including MPs Michaela Settle, Juliana Addison, Martha Haylett, mayor Des Hudson, Deb Harris from Women's Health Grampians, Cafs chief executive Wendy Sturgess and a host of others - join the students to hear their hopes for future change.
Committee for Ballarat chief executive Michael Poulton facilitated the day.
"The fact they want to hear from younger people, want to know how we feel and feel being in this environment, for them to take time from their day to come and understand how we are feeling means they do care," Bree said.
"It gives you hope for a change and that change is actually going to happen," Charlie said.
The forum at the Ballarat Regional Soccer Facility in Morshead Park was the first time that students of every secondary school have come together, and the project is the second time every secondary principal in the city has come together to tackle an issue - the first being the recent introduction of the Live 4 Life program in Ballarat schools following a spate of teen suicides.
Message from students
Phoenix P-12 Community College principal Karen Snibson, who instigated the forum, said the resounding message from students was they wanted more opportunities to work together across all schools.
"They've asked why it can't happen more, why does it take this?," Ms Snibson said. "They have shown us they can absolutely do it and they want to do it, they want to grapple with these hard topics ... what they have shown us is they want to live in a world that's hopeful."
Students and principals will now take their ideas back to implement in schools - while at the same time continuing to work together across all education sectors.
And principals have vowed to make the new-found cooperation among all Ballarat secondary schools an ongoing process.
"They (students) want to ensure there is consistency in education, in the approach across all sectors. It's something they highlight as important," she said.
Also vital is empowering young people to speak up and call out behaviour that is not helpful or might cause harm.
"We need to equip our kids with the ability to have that voice ... to call out unhelpful behaviour and to do that with confidence."
The influence of young people
Mayor Des Hudson said the students were "at the point of being able to influence a generation".
"We have seen over the last couple of years all our schools unite behind the common theme of protecting one another in terms of mental health and being able to have improved mental health outcomes through peer to peer and supporting one another; we are at that same moment with another difficult community issue," he said.
"The opportunity is where we go from here, and this has been the right platform to start from today. I'm really excited for our Ballarat community to again be leading the way in tackling a significant problem - and it's being youth-led with some great ideas."
The summit comes after Premier Jacinta Allan visited Ballarat High School on May 31 to announce a four-year-project in Ballarat to "saturate anti-violence awareness and action".
Wendouree MP Juliana Addison said Ballarat was in a unique position to address the issue of violence against women.
"Ballarat is going to lead the state, lead the nation and set international standards about how we treat women and how we address issues of violence against women," she said.
