Child Protection

A district youth protection training event at Kiwanis International in Indianapolis was held earlier this year. About 25 or so District Youth Protection Managers were present.

I was quite impressed by the organization of the event itself and the caring individuals who volunteer for Kiwanis. The Kiwanis employees who ran the event are first rate and knowledgeable. Executive Director Stan Soderstrom was there for almost the entire event, demonstrating his commitment to our Youth Protection Program. The program itself is advancing. We are getting smarter as an organization, having established (and continue to do so) both meaningful additional and modified policies and procedures. All of these efforts and initiatives result in the fact that our youth are better protected than ever before.

Probably the best part of the weekend was that you got a chance to learn from your peers. The group's conversations solicited many ideas. Some of those ideas included: 1) Always try, as a first option, to use school or commercial vehicles to transport children versus member's vehicles (e.g. insurance protection issues) 2) Learning about a new child protection organization called Darkness to Light which offers excellent additional, low-cost ($10, 2 hours long) training you might like to take. 3) We learned much about the KI "risk program" and new insurance, which is now part of our normal member dues, covering all of us.

I encourage you to download from the KI website (www.kiwanis.org) the new Club Insurance Resources Guide (available in PDF form) to learn the ins-and-outs of the protection it affords you. We live in a litigious world with an ever-increasing societal focus on child abuse. We therefore all need to be mindful of our risks when interacting with children. Your best way to mitigate those risks is to make sure you follow the KI youth protection guidelines!

Please make sure your clubs are paying more than lip service to the topic of youth protection. Too often our members attend training sessions or hold programs at club meetings but nothing is ever done after that! Make sure your club does not only go through the motions but actually does something about it.

A few things your club should be doing: 1) Form a club youth protection committee 2) Write a club youth protection policy and adopt it through a motion at your next board meeting 3) Be mindful of not allowing isolated situations between members and children to occur at any time. These situations are exactly what the child predator tries to take advantage of! In conjunction, remember what is the easiest way to treat any child interaction (i.e. a single adult in a car with a lone child) is not always the safest (i.e. follow the "rule of threes" which is part of the KI guidelines).

With all that said, thanks for all you are doing to protect our children.

Column Posted on Web Site July 23, 2015