General Information | Audience | Schedule | Program
Instructor | Textbook | Continuing Education Certificates
Special Segment for Trainers | Downlink Site Responsibilities
Downlink Site Registration  | Individual Attendee Registration

General Information

Child abuse is a major national concern. Studies show that each year over one million children are abused or neglected by their parents. The children who live through years of assault, degradation, and neglect bear emotional scars that can last for years. We all pay the price of their suffering. Maltreated children often grow up to vent on their own children--and others--the violence and aggression their parents visited on them.

Proper recognition and reporting is a fundamental first step in addressing the tragedy of child abuse. Better--and more accurate--reporting depends on continuing public and professional education efforts.

This teleconference is designed to provide high-quality training on the recognition and reporting of child abuse and neglect to professionals mandated to report suspected child maltreatment. The material will be suitable for those without any prior exposure to the subject as well as those who have had substantial experience making reports.

A special segment will introduce the newly published Recognizing Child Abuse: The Training Curriculum, and demonstrate its use.

Audience

Our target audience includes all the professions that see children who may be abused or neglect, including those who are legally mandated to report suspected cases and those who train them. Such professions include physicians, nurses, emergency room personnel, coroners and medical examiners, dentists, mental health professionals (psychologists and therapists), social workers, teachers and other school officials, day care or child care workers, and law enforcement personnel.

In some states, the list of those required to report suspected child abuse also includes pharmacists, foster parents, clergy, attorneys, day care licensing inspectors, film or photo processors, substance abuse counselors, children's camp counselors and staff, family mediators, staff and volunteers in child abuse information and referral programs, and religious healers (such as Christian Science practitioners).

Schedule

The training conference will originate from College Park, Maryland and will be distributed live via c-band satellite signal to downlink sites across the country. The program will run for 3 1/2 hours:

Eastern time: 12:00p.m.-3:30p.m.

Central time: 11:00a.m.-2:30p.m.

Mountain time: 10:00a.m.-1:30p.m.

Pacific time: 9:00a.m.-12:30p.m.

After the broadcast, some local sites may have expert panels to discuss the materials presented.

Program

The training will take place in a lecture format along with overheads created specially for distance-learning instruction.

The broadcast will be a one-way transmission. Audience questions from remote sites will be submitted by fax or e-mail for interactive discussion at the conclusion of each topic.

• Trainer’s preview: Review of materials (format, flexibility, and ease of modification); review of contents (models and key concepts); demonstrations of a lecture, the use of the textbook, and the exercises; and discussion of operational issues (e.g., audience, format, etc.).

• Making a difference: Review of training program, presenters, agenda, and materials; discussion of reasons for increased reporting, dangers of inappropriate reporting, and need for a balanced approach.

• Reporting obligations: Reportable child abuse and neglect, and mandatory and permissive reporting.

• Liability for failing to report: Civil and criminal penalties for not reporting.

• Protections for those who report: Legal immunity and other protections for those who report or cooperate with child protective efforts.

• Sources of suspicion: Reporting based on "reasonable suspicions" (or "beliefs"), and types and sources of suspicion.

• Key concepts: Threatened harm vs. serious injuries; "seriously harmful parental behavior"; parental incapacity; reporting "reasonable suspicions"; and direct and circumstantial evidence.

• Physical abuse: "Reasonable" corporal punishment vs. child abuse; "suspicious" injuries and the "battered child syndrome"; and behavioral indicators.

• Sexual abuse: Do children lie?; interviewing children; retracted statements. Assessing children’s statements, and physical and behavioral indicators.

• Physical neglect: Poverty vs. physical neglect, "physical deprivation," "severe dirt and disorder in the home," and medical neglect.

• Being prepared: Ongoing training; agency policies; and multidisciplinary teams.

Instructor

The trainer/instructor will be Douglas J. Besharov, a professor at the Maryland School of Public Affairs and first director of the United States National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect (1975-1979). Professor Besharov has conducted training on this and related subjects before professionals and community groups for almost 30 years.

Textbook

Professor Besharov's book, Recognizing Child Abuse (The Free Press, 1990), will be the textbook for the training. He will use it in lieu of other materials and handouts. Copies of Recognizing Child Abuse should be obtained in advance of the broadcast and are available through our website. (Allow 5-10 days for delivery.)

Order Recognizing Child Abuse

Curriculum: For information about the training curriculum that accompanies this program, click here

Continuing Education Certificates

The Maryland School of Public Affairs will offer certificates of continuing education to all who complete the course training. We expect that these certificates will be recognized for continuing education units (CEUs) by the Maryland Board of Social Work Examiners and the Maryland State Department of Education, and may be recognized reciprocally by other states' comparable agencies.

Attendees interested in obtaining such certification will apply online. There is a fee of $40 (through a secure credit card transaction). To obtain a certificate, attendees will be required to: 1) read Recognizing Child Abuse, Besharov (The Free Press, 1990); 2) take a pre-conference test; and 3) pass the test post-conference. The tests will be taken online and certificates will be mailed out upon passing the post-conference test. The CEU certification application and pre-conference test should be available approximately September 13.

Click here to apply for a Continuing Education Certificate

Special Segment for Trainers

The conference will begin with a "train-the-trainers" segment, addressed to professional trainers (although this segment will be useful instruction for all attendees). This segment will describe Recognizing Child Abuse: The Training Curriculum, a complete training curriculum based on the textbook Recognizing Child Abuse: A Guide for the Concerned, comprising 21 teaching modules organized into four units, accompanied by almost 100 overheads.

The curriculum contains everything trainers need to conduct their own training sessions on child abuse recognition and reporting.  It includes the textbook, training manual, and accompanying overheads, and is easily adaptable to accommodate sessions that are as short as three hours, two hours, and even one hour. In fact, individual modules can be presented independently.

Recognizing Child Abuse: The Training Curriculum may be purchased here on-line. Publication date is September 22. The pre-publication price is $85.00; after September 22, the price is $140.00.

Click here to order The Training Curriculum

Downlink Site Responsibilities

There is no registration fee for downlink sites. The conference is being structured to make it as easy as possible for local sites to participate in the training and, we hope, to use the program to engage key local professionals in ongoing efforts to combat child abuse and neglect.

The Satellite Coordinates for the broadcast are:

All you will need to provide is a room capable of receiving a c-band satellite downlink signal and an appropriate monitor. We will advertise your site to prospective attendees. When they arrive, all you will need to do is direct attendees to the appropriate room, and ensure that the room and video monitor(s) are set up properly to receive the teleconference.

We also encourage sites to enhance the program locally by inviting a panel of local experts to comment after the conference and respond to questions from the on-site audience (as we will do in Maryland). Local professionals will also appreciate the opportunity to build their network of contacts in this field.

Downlink Site Registration

To register as a site, we ask that you complete our online registration form as soon as possible. As you will see, it requests:

1. the site's full address (building name, room number, street address, etc.);

2. capacity (how many the site can accommodate);

3. name and phone number of a local contact (to field questions like parking, directions, etc.); and

4. any other information you would like us to post--such as a map showing your location, lunch instructions, and whether you want prospective attendees to call your site to confirm their plans to attend (in addition to our online attendee registration).

We will post this information on our website under Individual Attendee Registration.

We will also encourage individual attendees to register with us online, although we will not assess a registration fee for attendance. We will collect the online attendee registration information and advise local sites of expected attendance approximately on the Friday before the conference.

The Satellite Coordinates for the broadcast are:

Individual Attendee Registration

There is no registration fee for individual attendance. However, we request all attendees to complete our online registration form for attendance. The online registration form will be available on August 24. In addition, many local sites request that attendees ALSO call the local site contact in advance to advise of your plans to attend. This way we can ensure that there is room for all prospective attendees at the local sites.