After years of watching and working as a volunteer CASA guardian ad-Litem in child protection two things have become clear to me;
1) Abused and neglected children really do need a CASA guardian ad-litem advocate &
2) The system really needs insiders to speak loudly and repeatedly about the real world of America's child protection system.
Workers within the system (besides volunteer CASA guardian ad-Litems) find it politically unwise to say things that reflect badly on the system (at the risk of losing their jobs).
Volunteers have less to lose and by definition are "child advocates" (ie, Court Appointed Special Advocates).
As much as I respect the very hard work done by dedicated case workers (I mean every word of that - there is no harder work), case loads are too high, resources are too slim and few will risk their jobs to speak out about individual or system failures.
If I could change one thing in child protection today it would be the transparency, tracking and accountability demanded by those speaking out about the travesties they see every day.
The reason our communities don't have crisis nurseries, quality daycare and other child friendly programs that would promote learning and coping skills and launch at risk youth into productive lives is that we don't talk about it.
When you don't talk about it, it does not exist (and IT is not a problem).
"it" being the suicide by seven year old's on Prozac, sexual abuse and repeated horrific violence against six year old's that we see when they finally make it into Child Protection.
The only thing the public knows about the at risk children we see every day are the kids that die when the media brings it to public attention (generally showing a glaring system failure but solving nothing).
In Minneapolis, until Brandon Stahl and the Star Tribune made a focus on just how bad life was for poor four year old Eric Dean, media coverage about child abuse was almost non existent.
It is only because of this reporters consistent and intrepid work that Governor Dayton's "colossal failure" language formed a task force that brought public attention to absurd policies and gross negligence that desperately needed changing, that change happened.
My point is that until a thing is spoken of it does not exist and nothing is going to change. The public has a short memory and the media won't be here for long.
If all the public knows is that eight very young children have been murdered by their parents and caregivers since Eric Dean's death after 15 largely ignored reports of child abuse - it is a much smaller problem than the horrific stories that accompany a very large percentage of the tens of thousands of children reported to child protection in MN each year (and the 6 million children reported nationally each year).
Maybe I'm an optimist - but if more people were aware of the cyclical nature of child abuse, the prevalence and dangers* of medicating abused children with powerful anti-psychotic drugs (instead of adequate life changing therapies), how common life threatening behaviors are to damaged children and just how costly, impactful and long lasting abuse is for the thousands of children passing through Child Protection every year - our communities would support programs that would save those children from the terrors they have lived with and will continue to live with (and pass onto their children and the next generation).
All adults are the protectors of all children (thank you Don Shelby)
*about one third of children in child protection systems are proscribed these drugs
** Kids At Risk Action needs board members and board advisors with talent, resources and commitment to bring our advocacy to the next stage.
Contact mike@invisiblechildren.org