Children participate in decisions affecting them and are taken seriously. Arguably, the most important constituents of YSOs are children and parents. Yet organizational policies and practices are often developed and revised without substantive input from parents or especially children. True collaboration moves beyond communicating with parents and children (e.g., to inform them about policies) to actively involving them in key decision-making activities.

The United Nation’s Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) clearly embodies the international community consensus that childhood is a period of vulnerability and developmental importance that requires special protections from abuse, neglect, and exploitation. As well, the CRC in article 12 emphasizes the importance of children actively participating in decisions that affect them and being taken seriously—including strategies to promote their wellbeing and protect them from harm. The CRC also notes the importance of adults working with children to help them “articulate their lives, develop strategies for change and exercise their rights.”⁴⁷ Involving children, along with their parents, can lead to better decision making by increasing the amount and accuracy of information about children’s first-hand experiences that inform those decisions. The inclusion of parents is important, given their essential role in ensuring their children’s wellbeing and safety, and also because parents often have knowledge about the experiences of their children that will be relevant to decision making.

Principles of democratic participation underpin child and parent inclusion in safety-related decision making. In the 30 years since enactment of the CRC, much has been learned about how to appropriately engage children in decision making activities. Much of this pertains to properly engaging parents as well as children in the development of organizational policies and procedures and embodying principles of co-design and trauma-informed care, policy, and practice. Fundamental principles of democratic participation include but are not limited to

Participants understand what the project or process is about, what it is for, and their role within it;

Participants understand what decisions can be made and by whom;

Participants are involved at the earliest possible stage in any initiative;

All participants’ views are treated with equal respect, regardless of age or other factors.

Children and parents are treated as part of the solution to CSA.
Child safety is improved when organizations involve children and their parents not only in decision making but also in trainings and other efforts aimed at preventing, detecting, and responding to abuse.

There are several ways in which children and parents can be engaged as part of the solution:

We recommend that organizations with sufficient resources actively engage children and parents to obtain data on staff members’ fidelity to organizational principles, policies, and rules and to determine whether these are effective in preventing abuse.

Additionally, such surveys should help identify occasional or common rule-violating behaviors, which indicate the need to intervene with a given staff/ volunteer or to revisit the rule itself and generate new solutions in cases where the rule is violated by several people. There are many considerations to developing effective surveys. These include:

• Frame surveys as part of the organization’s commitment to child wellbeing;
• Include assessment of both exemplary and concerning behaviors;
• Ensure that survey items are easy to understand and clearly worded. Vaguely worded items about “inappropriate behavior” or “behaviors that made you feel uncomfortable” often fail to identify abusive behavior. Clearly worded items specifically about sexual abuse and other rule/boundary violations are needed to support the identification of concerning or abusive behaviors.
• Include a focus on organizational leadership as well as front-line workers and volunteers. We are all too aware of “powerful persons” who use their position to access and abuse children and who are often treated with deference that makes it difficult to identify or intervene in problematic behavior.
• Survey children and parents regularly and randomly. CSA (and other prohibited behaviors; i.e., boundary violating behaviors) is a hidden problem. Therefore, surveys should be conducted randomly and on a basis that aligns with organizational structure, activities, and typical staff turnover. Organizations in which children spend one-on-one time with mentors may decide to survey the child and parent frequently, perhaps early in the relationship and then every other month thereafter.

Organizations in which children participate in large groups for extended periods of time may select random subsets from each group to survey early in the tenure of a new staff member and then at regular intervals thereafter. Organizations that operate for brief but intense periods of time (e.g., 1- or 2-week camping experiences during summer months) may choose to survey a subsample of children from each new group of enrollees.

What Steps Does My Organization Take to Collaborate with Children and Parents?

This table identifies critical questions that are central to fostering collaboration among an organization, children, and parents. Leaders can use these questions and suggested strategies for addressing these questions to create their organization’s approach for increasing collaboration with children and parents.