It’s easier to identify behaviors that may be intended to harm children and youth when all staff and volunteers see the Code of Conduct as ...

Along with guiding appropriate behavior, your Code of Conduct should include a clear description of the lines of communication and reporting...

Keep in mind that a Code of Conduct is limited; it usually refers only to the most common and expected behaviors staff/volunteers may encounter each...

It’s essential that interactions between your employees/volunteers and the youth you serve are appropriate and positive, support positive youth...

Your Code of Conduct will provide your staff, volunteers, and others responsible for children and youth with very specific guidelines that will...

Your Code of Conduct will be unique to your organization, based on your size, purpose, location, staffing, ages served, additional vulnerabilities...

Your Code of Ethics helps to guide the behavior and decision-making of your staff, volunteers, and participants by clarifying the standards and...

Monitoring and responding to inappropriate behavior is a part of the job of every individual involved in your organization. It means observing...

Safety: The Most Critical Conversation It’s essential that your staff can easily discern inappropriate behavior and harmful actions. That’s...

Your organization will need to be prepared to respond to interactions observed among youth and between employees/volunteers and youth. With a...

It’s essential for your organization to create a culture that supports speaking up if inappropriate, harmful, or reportable behaviors take...

No matter how large or small a youth-serving organization is, or what services it provides,  every organization shares the desire to keep...

Policies for youth-serving organizations in Massachusetts should clearly identify the duties and responsibilities of all staff, reflect both Federal...

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) 1 suggests that implementing a child sexual abuse prevention policy and making the changes necessary to...

The attitudes of your leadership toward abuse prevention policies can have a direct effect on how the policies are viewed by your organization as a...

Whether your organization is evaluating an existing policy or creating a new one, we’ve provided a convenient Child Sexual Abuse Prevention (CSA)...

Sample Self-Audit Form for YSOs You can use the following “Self-Audit” form to take an inventory of your youth-serving organization’s abuse...

Sample Policies & Procedures You can find examples of policies and procedures from organizations whose mission is to serve and protect...

You can help protect the children you serve by maintaining an environment that prioritizes both preventing child abuse before it occurs and—since...

Mandated reporters are required to immediately report suspicions of child abuse and neglect to the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families...

Who Are Mandated Reporters? Massachusetts law defines a number of professionals as mandated reporters (for the full list, see MGL Chapter 119,...

Recognizing Abuse & Neglect The minimum required safety elements for you to prepare leadership, staff, and volunteers to recognize, respond...

Physical and Behavioral Indicators of Abuse 1 Type of AbusePhysical IndicatorsBehavioral IndicatorsPhysical Abuse● Unexplained bruises...

In addition to the institutions mentioned specifically in the 51A law, any youth-serving organization can identify a “designated agent”—an...

With some exceptions, a single incident or observation of suspected abuse or neglect may not necessarily trigger the need for a call to the...

Sometimes, a child/youth might self-disclose an abusive situation to an adult in your organization. These disclosures can be direct, where the child...

When a member of your staff suspects that a child is being abused and/or neglected, they are required to immediately call your local Department of...

Visit the website, Massachusetts Department of Children & Families Locations to find contact information for your local office and see...

DCF: What Happens When a Report Is Made? The “Protective Intake Policy” framework was designed “to clearly articulate a primary and...

Once your Code of Conduct is in place, it’s important to implement it through training and by disseminating the information widely, in a variety...

It is extremely disturbing for most adults to consider that a colleague or co-worker might be abusing children—but it happens. In these cases,...

Thinking of children or youth as capable of sexually abusing other children or youth can be difficult to consider and challenging to address. In...

The term Human Trafficking is used by Department of Children and Families (DCF) as an umbrella term used to include two specific allegations of...

Creating a safe environment starts with assessing your youth-serving organization’s situation and the physical spaces you use for programming and...

Safe Environment Strategies: Visibility Whether or not you can control the design of your space, physical safety depends on your ability to...

Safe Environment Strategies: Access Complementing the physical aspects of safety are the procedural aspects of safety and security, and how...

Along with site safety, visibility issues, physical access, and security procedures, supervision is a critical aspect of creating and maintaining...

Your youth-serving organization may provide transportation to children and youth—either on a regular or occasional basis. If you’re a larger...

Your Code of Conduct is an essential tool to help you ensure the safety of the children and youth in your care, and prevent child sexual abuse.

In the past, youth-serving organizations needed to worry about safety only within the physical environment—the building(s) where their services...

How is Your Facility Designed to Keep Children Safe? Child development and school-age programs operate in many different types of facilities....

One way you can help prevent child sexual abuse within your organization is by screening out those at risk to cause harm—before they are hired ...

Screening means thorough reference and background checks, including review of criminal and sexual offender records, for all employees, staff,...

Start with Basic Screening It is very important that all applicants who provide direct services and who are seeking positions of trust—either...

Here’s how you can develop a screening policy that fits your organization’s role, size, and resources: Know the screening rules and...

State and federal laws and regulations require specific types of screening and background checks—particularly criminal and sexual offense records...

To determine what screening tools are most appropriate to use for a particular position and to ensure consistency in your screening protocols, we...

To strengthen your screening and hiring process, you can use the questions in Thinking About Risk to make decisions about what additional background...

Criminal and sexual offense records checks are only part of the process of screening out individuals with the potential to harm children and youth....

Finding and retaining a qualified and diverse workforce is one of the greatest challenges for youth-serving organizations like yours. Given the...

A written application provides you with the information you need to assess the background and interests of applicants for your organization’s paid...

A personal interview provides an opportunity for you to meet applicants and determine if they are a good fit for your organization. It’s also a ...

Because the internet and social media are a rich source of information about prospective candidates, and social media is perceived as a forum in...

By checking a candidate’s references, you can obtain additional information about applicants and help verify their previous work and volunteer...

When possible, it can be informative to observe an applicant in your environment with the child(ren) and youth you serve, to look for potential red...

Criminal background checks are an important tool in your screening and selection process—and you should ensure that you’re aware of any federal,...

Certain organizations, such as public schools and licensed childcare programs, must also query national criminal record and fingerprint-based...

If a criminal record is discovered, its existence alone does not necessarily automatically disqualify a candidate from employment or volunteer...

Here are some best practices to consider when conducting your criminal background checks:  Save time and resources by delaying criminal...

For positions that specify an educational requirement, you should verify any credentials listed on the employment application by requesting and...

Change Can Be a Challenge “The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” So said the famed poet Robert Burns after ploughing his fields...

True Change: A Matter of Strategy and Culture Organizational changes are challenging enough, but the issue of child sexual abuse prevention and...

Common Implementation Roadblocks Natural conflicts exist between strategy and culture. These conflicts—if left unaddressed— predict that...

Open, Extensive Communication There are two keys to helping your organization change and sustain behaviors: the amount of communication that...

Why Collect Data? “Mathematics” and “measurement” are words that send many of us scurrying for cover, but in the world of organizational...

Depending on the size of your youth-serving organization, the data you’ll need to collect and analyze—or even simply summarize—could be...

Collaboration is “a mutually beneficial and well-defined relationship entered into by two or more organizations to achieve results they are...

Training Best Practices To protect the children/youth you serve, your organization needs a comprehensive framework: a set of abuse prevention...

Your organization has the opportunity to support and empower young people to feel confident, protected, and safe in their homes and communities....

The approaches in the chart below can provide frameworks that make your organization most effective when training adults and/or children/youth....

Whether designed in-house, provided by a government or state agency, or purchased from a commercial vendor, workplace training programs can take...

Training Program Design Checklist Each youth-serving organization is unique, and each community has its own set of values, strengths, and...

A Model for Evaluation: Kirkpatrick’s Four Levels of Training Every training course needs a method of collecting feedback to ensure a course is...

Effective abuse prevention training provides learners with new information, knowledge, and skills. Your leadership is critical to the ways in which...

Training for Different Audiences Training programs designed to prevent child sexual abuse take many forms and contain varying levels of detail,...

Training Contractors, Consultants, and Interns When it comes to training your contractors, consultants, and interns, there is certain core...

Training Employees/Staff/Leadership When it comes to training your employees, paid staff, managers, senior leaders, and board and governance...

When it comes to training your volunteers, there is certain core content that is critical to include in a comprehensive training program to...

Ideally, all children/youth should receive training and education on issues of personal safety and abuse prevention. However, not every organization...

Parents and other caregivers need to receive, at a minimum, the same level of prevention education as their child/youth. Parents can be strong...

Strangers are not the main offenders when it comes to child sexual abuse. Children and youth are much more likely to be abused by people ...

Ideally, all children/youth should receive training and education on issues of personal safety and abuse prevention. Personal safety and child...

Every YSO has certain risks associated with its activities, functions, and responsibilities—and thinking about those risks is an important part of...