{"id":11420,"date":"2024-04-26T15:05:13","date_gmt":"2024-04-26T19:05:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/?p=11420"},"modified":"2024-04-26T15:05:13","modified_gmt":"2024-04-26T19:05:13","slug":"child-protection-resource","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/2024\/04\/child-protection-resource\/","title":{"rendered":"Child protection resource"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Our congregation here in Cohasset, Mass., operates a preschool. The school is currently updating its child protection policy. As part of their research, the school&#8217;s governing board found the <a href=\"http:\/\/ymca.ymcaswimminganddiving.org\/nats\/2019SC\/ChildAbusePreventionPoliciesbranded.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">YMCA&#8217;s Child Abuse Prevention Policies.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you deal with child safety issues, the whole policy is worth reading. But I especially appreciated three parts of this policy document.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>1. First, they offer guidance on what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate physical interactions. Appropriate physical interactions include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Side hugs<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Shoulder-to-shoulder&#8230;hugs<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Pats on the shoulder or back<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Handshakes<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>High-fives and hand slapping<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Verbal praise<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Pats on the head when culturally appropriate<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Touching hands, shoulders, and arms<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Arms around shoulders<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Holding hands (with young children in escorting situations) <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Personally, I&#8217;d be more restrictive than this list\u2014 e.g., I&#8217;d be very reluctant to pat a child on the head, or touch shoulders. And I&#8217;d only put arms around shoulders in extreme situations, e.g., when comforting a crying child. Nevertheless, I think this is a good summary. I&#8217;ll let you look at the actual document to see what constitutes inappropriate touch. (No sitting on laps! No piggyback rides!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>2. Also worth looking at is the YMCA&#8217;s straightforward summary of appropriate electronic communications. No private messaging with a Facebook &#8220;friend&#8221; who is under age! No &#8220;friending&#8221; under age people on any social media!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>3. Third, I really appreciated their policy on &#8220;Managing the risk when one staff member is alone with one youth.&#8221; We have policies where you should never be alone one-on-one with a legal minor. And there are always times when it seems necessary, e.g., when talking about a young person about behavior issues. Straightforward guidance \u2014 if you have to have a one-on-one, do so in a public place where you are in full view of others (I&#8217;ve done this where I made sure my supervisor was nearby, and deliberately watching). If you have to meet in a room, leave the door open. If a young person discloses abuse, etc., document it immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A final comment: What I especially like about this document is that it answers just about all the questions I&#8217;ve ever gotten from volunteers and paid staff when I&#8217;ve done training in child abuse prevention policies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Our congregation here in Cohasset, Mass., operates a preschool. The school is currently updating its child protection policy. As part of their research, the school&#8217;s governing board found the YMCA&#8217;s Child Abuse Prevention Policies. If you deal with child safety issues, the whole policy is worth reading. But I especially appreciated three parts of this &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/2024\/04\/child-protection-resource\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Child protection resource&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[1095],"class_list":["post-11420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-religious-education","tag-child-protection"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11420"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11420\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11421,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11420\/revisions\/11421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danielharper.org\/yauu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}