Child sexual abuse is not easy to talk about. Even as individuals and communities get better at it all the time, the statistics, especially in Alaska, remain deplorable.
As many as 8,000 children in Alaska each year are victims of either physical or sexual abuse, according to the Alaska nonprofit Standing Together Against Rape, and Alaska consistently has one of the top five rape rates in the nation, according to the Child Welfare League of America. Keep in mind -- statistics are always based on known cases. There are many more that occur under the radar, undocumented by data.
Much is being done in school and in homes to teach children how to say no to uncomfortable situations, to leave those situations and to let an adult know what happened -- what's known as the "No! Go tell." model. But for one Colorado woman, this approach falls short of what should be the ultimate goal.
"What adults do is focus prevention on teaching to kids to say no. And it is not your child's job to protect themselves," said Feather Berkower, founder of the group Parenting Safe Children. Berkower has spent 30 years educating families about how to send a signal to would-be offenders that their kids are "off limits." It starts at home, with parents who are willing to push through the social discomfort of talking about child sexual abuse with other adults, and start building what she calls "prevention teams."
"It focuses on teaching adults how to create environments for children that are safe, how to make their children as best as they can off limits to abusers. Caregivers need to be willing to push through the discomfort," Berkower said, adding "Are you willing to feel a little uncomfortable so that your children don't have to?"
To be clear, Berkower is not criticizing Alaska's efforts. But she is passionate about child safety and about motivating parents and caregivers to create prevention teams as a core aspect of keeping children safe from abuse.
Her concept asks parents to have the courage to normalize conversations about body safety, just as they would talk with other caregivers about wearing seat belts and bike helmets, food allergies and gun safety in homes where play dates and sleepovers take place.
She encourages parents to have the same conversation with anyone in the child's life that acts as a caregiver: parents, siblings, relatives, grandparents, neighbors, friends, teachers, coaches, church groups. It's up to the parent to do the best job possible vetting those environments and making a decision about whether their child is truly safe there.
These conversations do two things, according to Berkower. First, "you are saying 'my child is off limits so don't even try if you are thinking about it' and two, 'will you be on my prevention team?' This builds a network of prevention team caregivers," Berkower said.
She does not minimize how awkward or difficult starting such conversations can be.
"Proactively building your prevention team is the cornerstone to prevention. And parents also say it is the hardest part of prevention," Berkower advises in her online Parenting Safe Children video course.
"By bringing it up you are helping build the capacity for more families to participate in prevention and protect their own children. That's awesome," said Keeley Olson, executive director of Standing Together Against Rape. STAR runs a somewhat similar program called HEART, she said. In its fledgling stages and in need of more funding, the multi-week education course primarily concentrates on at-risk families and their children -- those who may be homeless or in temporary shelters.
Berkower's program begins with educating parents about what grooming looks like, and who potential offenders may be. Grooming is the slow, methodical process by which a predator builds trust-based relationships with a child and/or their family to gain access to alone time with children and to seduce or even blackmail children into sexual abuse. Up to 40 percent of sexual offenders are youth under the age of 18. As many as 90 percent of offenders are well-known to the child and their family, according to Berkower.
In speaking with incarcerated offenders, Berkower said a common theme emerges when the abusers talk about kids they probably won't target. "They look for parents who are paying close attention to the people their children spend time with," and for "parents who speak up about their child's safety," she said.
The Parenting Safe Children model is comprehensive and too thorough to cover in a single column. But some highlights include:
• Tell your child "you are the boss of your body." This doesn't mean they get to choose their bedtime, or refuse to put on sunscreen, but it does mean they get to decide who hugs and kisses them, and who touches them. This is just one of 10 body safety rules Berkower teaches.
• No secrets allowed.
• Ask your child to follow rules at school, but give them permission to make exceptions if they feel unsafe, uncomfortable or if a body safety rule is being broken. Berkower likes to say "Safety first. Manners second."
• Tell your child's caregivers that your family has body safety rules, share those rules openly and ask if those expectations are a match for that family or institution. It should be a comfortable fit with no red flags. This is where building the prevention team comes in.
• Trust your intuition.
• With sports teams, schools and church groups, ask how they screen their staff, if they have written policies about safe touch, what kind of additional body safety education is given, and whether adults are ever alone with children.
• Watch for indirect signs of abuse, like a child who is suddenly afraid of sleeping in a particular location, or who has became untraditionally moody or fearful. Ask questions, and believe, love and support your child if you suspect a problem. Do the same not just for a child victim, but also for a child who may have acted out inappropriately. Seek professional help.
Berkower's concept puts parents on the front lines and creates strong safety networks oriented toward raising confident, healthy, harm-free kids.
The bottom line?
"The more your talk about child sexual abuse with caregivers, the safer your children can be," Berkower said.
Correction: An earlier version of this story misidentified Parenting Safe Children as a nonprofit organization.
Jill Burke is a longtime Alaska journalist writing from the center of a busy family life. Her father swore by "Burke's Law No. 1 -- never take no for an answer." Meaning, don't give up in the face of adversity. The lesson stuck. Share your ideas with her at jill@alaskadispatch.com, on Facebook or on Twitter.
The views expressed here are the writers' own and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints.