The Violence Against Women Act was first authorized in 1994 by Congress. It was the first federal legislation that acknowledged  domestic violence as crime that did warrant a response from law enforcement. It requires reauthorization every five years. It expired in 2019 but was recently passed by the House of Representatives. To learn more about …

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Volunteers are an essential part of daily operations at Sarah’s Inn and make important contributions toward ending domestic violence in the communities we serve.If you are interested in becoming a volunteer at Sarah’s Inn, please contact volunteering@sarahsinn.org

Dr. Jacquelyn Campbell is a national leader in research and advocacy in the field of domestic violence or intimate partner violence (IPV). She has authored or co-authored more than 250 publications and seven books on violence and health outcomes. Her expertise is frequently sought by national and international policy makers in exploring IPV and its health …

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Dr. Lenore Walker began studying violence against women inthe 1970s after working with children and mothers in the first part of hercareer. In 1979, she published TheBattered Woman, which helped raise awareness for domestic violence. As partof her work, she recorded the Cycle of Abuse based on the patterns that shefound when interviewing women who had experienced …

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Susan Schechter was a pioneer in creating programs to explore how domestic violence impacts children. She created aprogram focused on children that were experiencing abuse and living within a home impacted by domestic violence. Susan saw the way that domestic violence, poverty,child abuse, and substance abuse intersect and worked on creating solutions to support best …

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Esta Soler is the founder of Futures Without Violence, which works to end violence against women and children. Soler and Futures without Violence were key leaders in advocating for the passage of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) in 1994. To learn more, please visit: https://www.sarahsinntv.org/post/40-stories-esta-soler

Although she had always been passionate about civil rights, in the 1970s Ellen Pence turned her focus to domestic violence, which at that time was referred to as the battered women’s movement. Ellen and several other activists at the time wanted to change the narrativeand response to domestic violence. Ellen and her colleagues in Duluth, …

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Sarah’s Inn’s Youth Committee meets twice a month and is an opportunity for local high school students to become advocates for domestic violence. Although most of the current students are from OPRF, Fenwick, and Trinity, students from all neighboring high schools are welcome to get involved. Each month the students discuss a specific question related …

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Sarah’s Inn has had a few homes over the last 40 years and we have served the community from Oak Park, Chicago, and now Forest Park. Each office and each building represent a step towards our current facility. In January 2020, we moved into our newly remodeled building in Forest Park which provides the much …

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Through the Together Strong Project, Sarah’s Inn provided violence prevention programming to over 10,000 students at local schools throughout the community this year.

Each December, Sarah’s Inn hosts an annual Holiday Gift Project for our clients. This event has evolved over the years from a few donors dropping off gifts for clients in the greatest need to in recent years being a full day event that included a meal, childcare, support for our clients, and wrapping of presents. …

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Sarah’s Inn launched an Internship Program in 2010 with one MSW student in our Counseling and Advocacy Program. Today we have an average of 12 students and year of service fellows working across all program areas, contributing more than 10,000 hours of service per year.

The Sarah’s Inn logo has evolved over our 40 years, and this year we have a special 40th Anniversay logo!

Forest Park Review’s Maria Maxham interviews Sarah’s Inn Executive Director Carol Gall

It isn’t every day that the Sarah’s Inn staff has the pleasure of walking down memory lane with the founders of Sarah’s Inn. The 40th Anniversary is a great time to pause and listen to the story of how we started 40 years ago and where we are today. We sat down “over zoom” with …

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Sarah’s Inn was founded in 1980, and at that time it was common for women’s services organizations to contain a woman’s name. Sarah is from the Bible, but our name does not have a religious connotation. The founders thought we would be a shelter, so they added the word “Inn”. Since 1980 our agency has …

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