Students Learn How to Break Up in the 21st Century

Breaking up is hard to do. So is being a teenager. Mix the two and you can end up with a tough situation on your hands. 

About 100 Boston students attended a special seminar in the Fenway neighborhood this week. The Breakup Summit, put on by the Boston Public Health Commission’s Division of Violence Prevention in partnership with Simmons College brought students together to discuss how to manage breakups in a healthy way.  

The fourth annual seminar focused this year on gender norms and how gender stereotypes in our society impact teen breakups. The event featured feature interactive workshops that allow participating teens and adults from youth-serving organizations to build skills to end relationships in a constructive way. 

“I see a lot of guys being pressured to move on quickly after a break up while girls are influenced to try to work out the relationship, even if it is unhealthy,” says Sam Peguero, 17, a peer leader in BPHC’s Start Strong Boston program.  “What’s missing a lot of the time is good advice on how to end a relationship in a way that’s healthy for both people involved.”

Teens discussed current trends in breaking up, strategies to avoid the make-up-to-breakup cycle, and creating “digital boundaries.”  Workshops included “Breakups 101,” where teens will discuss how gender norms can influence breakups; “Be Right Back,” a conversation on how to engage in a healthy breakup and how to avoid behaviors that can lead to additional hurt or anger; and “Got to Go,” a workshop where teens will discuss how to have a healthy breakup when life circumstances, such as going away to college or moving out of town, put too much stress on a relationship.

“It is important for us to talk with teens about how to engage in break ups in a respectful way and how they can create healthy boundaries, both online and offline,” said Nicole Daley, director of Start Strong Boston.  “There are so many gender stereotypes about how young men and young women should engage in breakups, regardless of their sexual orientation.  This summit seeks to shed light on those messages and to allow teens to explore how they play out in real life.”

The overall program is part of an $18 million investment by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Blue Shield of California Foundation to promote healthy relationships among 11- to 14-year-olds and to identify promising ways to prevent teen dating violence before it starts.