Comments

Katherine and Dallas, I am very proud of the effort you have made to make all of this a reality.

I commend you and all involved in such an important mission. Before becoming a stay-at-home mom who is very active in my community, I was a journalist for 12 years. Throughout much of my career I covered both the education beat and crime and public safety for daily newspapers such as the Oregonian, Seattle Times and various San Francisco Bay Area papers. I remember opening the top drawer of my desk at work one day only to realize I had accumulated too many photos of murdered or missing children. I have interviewed many families who have suffered from this loss and do not wish it upon anyone. I have to admit my experiences made me quite paranoid about the concerns regarding child abduction, rape, torture and all other unfathomable things people might do to any child. Although honestly, because of my experiences I truly believe folks can never be too careful these days. That is why this project hits close to my heart. Again my sincerest congratulations and gratitude to everyone who conceived, participated and are still involved with your Just Yell Fire project.

I just used some of your organization's history in my end of course sum up for my word processing and computer tech classes. My overall message this year has been to encourage my middle school aged students to use the tools being learned to find their voice and to be heard.

After I send this email out I plan on purchasing your book to use in future classes.

Thank you for being such a great role model to my students who are told by society and by education in general to sit down and be quiet far too often.

Sincerely,

Calvin

Matheson Junior High

Just dropped in to salute your work. I'm with you. I'm doing my second year under graduate in Chennai, TN, India. If there s something I can do for this cause, I m ready to. Salute once again n keep going. My wishes to you.

I've just spent my whole weekend to watch this superb film. I've just emailed all my friends and family this film so they could watch it too and teach their children the useful information. I always wanted to go to courses in how to defend myself but just haven't got around to doing it. Now I'm going to have a Just Yell Fire-evening with my girlfriends to practice and to talk about the film.

Thank you so much for doing this film!

It's awesome what you have done. I'm 55 years old, and I have watched the statistics my whole life. I was traumatized when I was young, too, and it is astounding how many young girls have uninvited sexual advances made toward them, not to mention being raped or murdered. Thanks you for your work. You know how important it is.

This is a comment sent in to our trainers Leila Rae Sommerfeld and Valerie Mainridge of Gresham, OR

Thank you again from our entire team! You and Valerie did such a fabulous job. Several of our volunteers commented at the end that your traiing was the best self-defense class they had ever taken - and several had attended classes in the past. you adapted your presentation to fit perfectly into our time constraints and skill level. You and Valerie brought such great energy and enthusiasm to our class. We especially appreciate you taking time on a Sunday. We feel empowered to continue to advocate for sexually exploited women in and around Portland.

We are so pleased to know you and your work. I hope this is only the beginning of our partnership.

I just wanted to say that what you're doing is an absolutely AMAZING thing. I am one of the Managers at the Build a Bear Workshop in Annapolis MD and I discovered your organization after flipping through a preview of our upcoming Huggable Heroes calendar. While it's always great to see kids helping other kids, in 6 years a BABW, none of the organizations ever REALLY hit home with me...but your's definitely did. I am 23 now, but when I was 16...I had a boyfriend that brutally attacked me. I feel like knowing more about how to fight back might've not only prevented the first incident, but things I went through for two and a half years with this boy after the fact. A film like your film would've really been a great thing to see in school...or anywhere really. So, while this isn't a strong enough word by any stretch of the imagination, kudos on what you've done and continue to do here!!!

I just had the pleasure of reading the article �Fighting Fire with Fire� by Dallas Jessup in the Current Health 2 � Sept. 2009 issue and watched the Just Yell Fire video on the website listed. What a tremendous video! I want to extend my sincere thanks to Dallas and everyone involved in making this video and to let you know I plan to include it in my Human Sexuality Course that I teach as part of my health curriculum. Thank you for helping all girls everywhere stay safe!

The DVD is a great Help, our 19 cheerleaders were impressed, they talked things over..we got in a big circle and then we practiced all the hits/kicks/ and we had a black belt from our YMCA come in and he held their arm, they all got away, it was the most fun I've had in a long time, and I was proud of the girls for putting effort and concentration into what they were doing. I think they learned what they needed to learn.