Reaching Out - The volunteer in Child Abuse and Neglect Programs

• NCJ Number: 73603
• Author(s): N Fisher
• Date Published: 1979
• Length: 64 pages
• Contract Number(s): HEW-105-77-1050
• Sponsoring Agency: US Dept of Health and Human Services
• Corporate Author: Kirschner Associates, Inc
• Sale Source: National Institute of Justice/; US Department of Health, Education, and Welfare
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: User Manual Series

Annotation

The booklet describes the roles of volunteers in helping abused children and abusive parents, offers advice to agencies wanting to begin or maintain a volunteer program, and offers guidance to prospective volunteers.

Abstract

A strong tradition of using volunteers in the helping professions exists in the United States. Today, many volunteers are working directly with abused and neglected children and their families. Volunteers are committed, have time available, and can increase the efficiency of child protective service agencies. Volunteers usually are asked to perform support services (office work, transportation, or food and clothing collections), services for children (babysitting and hospital visits) or service for parents (answering crisis calls on hotlines, working in the courts as family advocates, or being a friend to the parent). Before a volunteer makes a commitment to work for a child protection program, it is necessary to understand what is involved. The volunteer should be able to commit a sizable amount of time to the program, determine how volunteers will be treated by agency staff, and understand the realities of child abuse and neglect. The volunteer must be able to deal with the hostility of agency personnel or the troublesome nature of ethical questions arising in such work. An agency wishing to establish a volunteer program must assess its need for volunteers, launch a recruitment effort designed to attract a cross-section of the community's population, set up administrative procedures specifying what is required of volunteers, and establish an effective training program. Volunteers can find opportunities for work in local child protective service agencies, family or juvenile courts, the research projects of local universities and colleges, public and private placement agencies which handle abused or neglected children, local volunteer organizations, and police departments. Volunteer-agency contract statements, job descriptions, and a sample volunteer information sheet are included in the exhibits presented. A list of resource centers and 19 references are supplied.