Support Child Abuse Prevention Month through our 2012 SAFE Campaign

April is Child Abuse Prevention Month, and, as strong supporters of this cause, we’re helping this year’s campaign by raising awareness of the current (and ongoing) problem of unsafe adults in trusted situations who sexually abuse children. We’ll be posting information on a regular basis this month, included in a weekly email, to remind you that, no matter the size of your program budget, the costs connected to child abuse - in both human and financial terms - are expensive, but prevention is affordable.

We’re also launching a campaign to raise funds to help us publish a second edition of our highly recommended resource, SAFE (Screening Applicants for Effectiveness): Guidelines to Prevent Child Molestation in Mentoring and Youth-Serving Organizations. Created with our over 30 years of experience and recent research, SAFE is the solution to preventing child molesters from gaining access to vulnerable children through mentoring and other volunteer programs. Help us reach more youth professionals, and keep more children SAFE, by providing new resource and training to prevent child sexual abuse.

We’re asking your help in raising $25,000 to create and publish a new edition of SAFE. This version will include a trainer’s manual, featuring updated research on child sexual abusers, more recommended tools and processes for programs to implement, and information from our chapter, Mentor Screening and Youth Safety, included in the upcoming Handbook on Youth Mentoring, 2nd edition, to be published this fall.

• Please donate and help us reach more youth-serving programs to prevent child sexual abuse. Even $10 will help us achieve our goal!
  

• Read about our response to the Penn State scandal.
  

• Learn more about SAFE (Screening Applicants for Effectiveness): Guidelines to Prevent Child Molestation in Mentoring and Youth-Serving Organizations.
  

• Remember that youth, not the mentors, are the clients. Read more tips about mentor screening and youth safety.
  

• Approximately 75-90% of abusers are known by their victims--these include relatives, teachers, coaches, and mentors. Read more statistics.
  

• Who’s Lending a Hand? A National Survey of Nonprofit Volunteer Screening Practices, from The National Center for Victims of Crime, is the first survey of national nonprofits and their screening practices. The results indicate that more programs need to do more! Read more resources to see what else is available.
  

SAFE TESTIMONIALS

“This session was applicable to the current daily functioning of my program. I left with a concrete solution to a difficult decision that I am currently faced with.”

“Thank you for taking the time to put together this valuable information. Knowledge is powerful. But Applied Knowledge is what really makes the difference.”

“SAFE is one of the best resources we have utilized in our program. Thank you for making these presentations available to all of us!”

“Kudos! I attend a lot of trainings on youth protection, and I definitely came away with some new tools to use in my job. Thanks!”