CHOOSING A CHILD SAFE ORGANIZATION
As a parent, you will make many decisions about where to send your child for school, child care, or extra-curricular activities and programs. While it is not easy to think about the issue of child sexual abuse, you will be more confident as a parent if your child is in a safe environment.
A child-safe organization is one that:
- Understands child sexual abuse
- Manages risk by implementing strategies to reduce it
- Takes their responsibility of protecting children from victimization seriously
- Recognizes their ethical and legal obligation to help protect the children they serve
- Builds a culture of transparency, trust and openness among employees, volunteers, children and parents
- Has safeguards in the form of policies and procedures to prevent or stop child sexual abuse
- Keeps the safety of children paramount
- Hires the right people (job description, job posting, interviewing, screening, reference checks, etc.)
- Provides an orientation to new employees/volunteers that includes information on child sexual abuse
- Supervises and monitors employees/volunteers
- Trains employees/volunteers on child sexual abuse
- Provides information and training to parents and children
- Has clear policies in place to deal with disclosures of child sexual abuse or allegations of employee/volunteer misconduct
- Has and enforces a code of conduct
- Has a child protection manual, including policies, that is available to parents
