Child Abuse Prevention Month Highlights

By Lindsey Castellanos

We were busy little bees around Child Advocates of Fort Bend for Child Abuse Prevention Month! The amazing thing is how far our education and message can reach when our community comes together! Kicking off the month with Light of Hope on March 31st at Wessendorff Park was a huge hit! The weather was perfect for a movie in the park, and we hosted 12 different partners that help support and strengthen families Those partnerships are important because the more resilience a family has to stress the better protected the children in that family can be

Staff and volunteers were honored to speak to students at Lamar Consolidated ISD Culver Elementary Our children’s presentations are a developmentally appropriate way for children to learn what safety looks like Children have a much different and more innocent perspective of the world That innocence is protected and safe guarded when children can recognize red flags behaviors and situations Children can be empowered to speak up for themselves or friends in situations that may not be safe This is the first step to prevention! The 5 safety rules they learn in our programs allow them to apply those ideas to any type of unsafe situation with adults or other youth

Having a safe adult that knows how to respond to child abuse, neglect, red flags or disclosures is important as children find strength in their voice From the FBISD Whole Child Health Expo to speaking with Rotary of Fulshear to training adults in Darkness to Light: Steward of Children, Child Advocates of Fort Bend is spreading awareness and education to keep our children in Fort Bend County safer! We spoke to clinical staff at Access Health and many different parent groups through Head Start programs throughout the county

Our faith-based community is busy as well Congregations shared our education information through bookmarks filled with facts and ways to respond t were able to “Walk the Walk Based and Community Eng awareness event at Long Acr this information going out, ea adults and children who atte will have more tools to make for the safety of all children

April is just the start! Child here Each of us has the oppor in preventing abuse for one ch epidemic thrives in secret T information and understandi support families and childr engage in a hard conversat questionable behavior or uns more we tell our children th them if they are hurt the m the problem

We are happy to come to sp about this important topic.

For a list of speaking topics or speaker click here.