Download Advocacy and Prevention - Children`s Home Society of South Dakota

Children's Home Society: Advocacy and Prevention
Children’s Home Society’s Advocacy and Prevention Program has grown from an idea to a mission over
the past few years. Through the faith of our leadership and support of generous donors, CHS was able to
position themselves as an expert in the area of child abuse prevention. We were ready, and had proven
ourselves to be a capable leader in this field, when others in the state began asking for more preventative
services. For example, SDCL 2-6-31 established the Jolene’s Law Task Force in 2014 to study the impact
of sexual abuse of children in South Dakota and to make recommendations to the legislature on policies to
effectively address the issue. They sought to understand this issue through study of evidence-based
research and quality data metrics. In 2016, the Task Force set out to develop a 10 year plan to accurately
capture and analyze data, support response in the private and tribal health care settings, educate and support
law enforcement, address judicial system processes, educate mandatory reporters, and develop a
comprehensive statewide prevention system. CHS has been an active member of this group since its
inception in 2014. In 2015, CHS was asked to take the lead in the area of prevention. CHS is currently
developing a framework and objectives to support several identified prevention goals of the Task Force.
Coordinate a statewide child sexual abuse awareness campaign.
We are currently looking at the Enough Abuse Campaign out of Massachusetts, which is grounded in
Adverse Childhood Experience (ACEs ) research and uses Social Ecological Model and Spectrum of
Prevention Models to lead substantive societal level change. The campaign includes print and electronic
materials, as well as using a train the trainer model to provide education and outreach.
Launch a coordinated effort to teach prevention to students in school systems as well as their parents.
Although child abuse is an adult problem, it is critical to provide youth with empowering messages and
educate them on body safety. We are currently exploring evidence based curriculum for school-aged
children that could be implemented across SD schools.
Launch a coordinated effort to teach prevention in youth serving and faith-based organizations.
These organizations strive to create a safe place for children to learn, grow, and play. It is vital that these
organizations take actions to discuss, recognize, address, and prevent child abuse. Education to these
groups will focus on policy recommendations, safe environments, guidelines for interactions, responding to
inappropriate behavior, and staff training.
Create trauma-informed and self-healing communities.
We are currently developing a framework for launching 4-5 trauma informed community pilot projects
across the state. Programs such as ACE Interface offer a proven framework and strategy for rapidly
disseminating information about the Adverse Childhood Experiences study, along with neurobiology that
explains why ACEs have so much effect in people’s lives, and what we can all do to dramatically improve
health and resilience for this and future generations.
Additionally, Children’s Home continues to move forward on developing and marketing the What If…?
cards. All four age-based versions have been printed and feedback is overwhelmingly positive. Future
projects include:
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Working with University of South Dakota on a research project to evaluate the cards through a pilot
study
Exploring development of an App version of the cards
Piloting the cards at a private K-12 school
Utilizing the website and social media to market the cards
Submitting proposals to national conferences to present on this innovative tool; although conference
fees are often waived for presenters this does require transportation, lodging, and other travel costs.