Training session aims to protect children

HAMMOND — Several dozen community workers — from campus police to child-care providers — attended a training session a few weeks before Christmas, at Southeastern Louisiana University. The training session was aimed at helping the most vulnerable of victims: children.

The program, Darkness to Light, Stewards of Children is a revolutionary sexual abuse prevention training program that educates adults to prevent, recognize, and react responsibly to child sexual abuse, Child Advocacy Services Chief Executive Officer Rob Carlisle said.

The program offers training on seven steps for protecting children from sexual abuse. In addition to prevention training for individuals, the full program package includes tools for organizations that facilitate the development of policies and procedures for sexual abuse prevention.

“This training will give you practices and policies for protecting children,” Carlisle said.

The goal, Carlisle said, is to “stop sex abuse before it happens.”

The problem of child sexual abuse is real, Carlisle warned those attending the training.

In 2011, CAS conducted 461 forensic interviews for child sexual abuse. According to statistics, Carlisle said one in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually assaulted before their sixteenth birthday.

The problem is also one that becomes a “community problem,” he said.

As those participating in the training learned, a child who is sexually abused is more likely to commit violent crimes, become pregnant as a teenager and abuse alcohol or drugs.

Sponsored by CAS, the program teaches that child safety is an adult’s job, he said.

“This (training) requires adults to take responsibility for protecting children instead of teaching children what to do to prevent it,’ he said.

The course includes:

• A comprehensive program that incorporates all of the fundamental mechanics necessary in creating organizational policies and procedures that keep children safe. Ideal for training staff and volunteers on child sexual abuse prevention.
• The “7 Steps to Protecting our Children,” Darkness to Light’s core, evidence-based educational tool for sexual abuse prevention.
• A 2.5-hour training program that integrates the simple principles of choice, consciousness, and personal power to promote an understanding of the nature and impact of child sexual abuse, and that uses those principles to provide a context for empowered action. The curriculum is direct about holding each adult accountable, and generous in providing powerful, specific support for personal change.
• A video component of the curriculum that integrates personal stories of sexual abuse survivors, sharing their experiences of trauma and healing with the perspectives of professionals working with various issues of sexual abuse.

The information is generally used by organizations that seek training for staff and volunteers in the prevention of child sexual abuse, and by organizations that need to respond to insurance requirements regarding child protection.

In addition to the course held at SLU, CAS offered the training program to Livingston Parish residents on Nov. 18.

For more information on the program, log on to http://www.childadv.net.