HOME
BACK
Cross the Bridge of Secrecy Sexual abuse victims have a treacherous bridge to cross -- disclosure of their nightmare. They see the bridge -- but are too frightened to cross it. The toll is too high. We must remove the toll and open the bridge. The school is singularly the best place to bridge the gap for sexual abuse victims. Yet, it is up to the discretion of the local school system whether to promote -- permit -- or even prevent -- sexual abuse education and research programs in the schools. It's time to break through the school barriers. Six Steps Across the Bridge Review your state's position on sexual abuse prevention programs in the school. Local school systems generally have the right to prevent and prohibit these child saving programs from our schools -- and from our children. Push state legislation for mandated school based sexual abuse education and research programs. -- Or at least -- push legislation mandating that schools cannot prevent sexual abuse education programs from being presented in our schools. Include research with sexual abuse education and prevention programs to assess the effectiveness of the programs in reducing undisclosed victimization. and to provide community awareness on the extent of sexual crimes inflicted on our children. Remember -- when pre-test/post-test research is used to assess sexual abuse education. it only tells us that our children heard the information and see the bridge -- It doesn't tell us how many silent victims are still too afraid to cross the bridge of secrecy. Review the Sexual Abuse Recognition And Non-Disclosure Inventory (SARANDI) research project for assessing undisclosed sexual victimization. Provide support with your letter sharing concern for our young victims and endorsing the value of pursuing this research. Spread the word and the information on this research to anyone you can -- make it visible. A large segment of the general public still want to close their eyes to this outrage because it has the word sex in it -- and involves parts of the body that adults don't want to talk about.
