Recently the Chronicle of Higher Education asked me to write an article on how Penn State University failed to create the safeguards necessary to protect kids and colleges.   Here is the link for the article:  http://chronicle.com/article/Protecting-Children-Also/135526/  

The message is similar to the one I wrote a decade before in my University of New England Press book on How To Keep Your Children Safe and articles that I’ve written for the Child Care Exchange. Let me summarize the bottom line:

When a parent allows an organization of any sort to interact with their child, they are assuming that the organization and its employees will adhere to professional conduct and implement all policies and behaviors necessary to keep their children safe.  There is an implicit trust placed upon organizations to protect children and youth.  When they fail to do so, the partnership is shattered.  This is undoubtedly why the Boy Scouts, the Catholic Church, and Penn State tried to hush their employees’ problematic and abusive behaviors. The public now is skeptical of any and every organization and business with whom their children interact.  Things that perhaps a business could get away with in the past are more likely to be targets of concern.  False accusations could be made when a business isn’t transparent about their practices.  A  wise self-preservation strategy for organizations is simply “to do the right things” to protect kids.  In doing this, they protect their workers and themselves.  The bottom  line is that organizations have a wonderful opportunity to be a major force for social change when they add a child abuse prevention training protocol to their operations.

We can help you to help yourself.  Contact CAPTA4.Org and explore the many ways how at capta4.org@gmail.com