Can I provide Child Abuse and Neglect to my staff?

Question

This is my first year as a Group Child Care Center Director in Wisconsin, child care providers are required to have training in Child Abuse and Neglect every two years. We will be having inservice days and I would like to do a presentation on Child Abuse and Neglect. Am I able to present the information to staff or do I have to have someone else some to the center to provide the training? Please help!

Answer 1

I worked at a Preschool in a church.  The director had a woman who was an RN and a member of the congregation, do the training for us.  We had notebooks of the material she covered, and a certificate at the end of the session.  

Answer 2

I work in child care too, as a provider, and if I were you I'd ask your state licensing agency, whatever it's called in WI, and find out what the requirements are. I wouldn't take the advice of anyone on here unless they work for that state department in WI. You don't want to do this wrong, or do the wrong thing, and then be out of compliance with the state licensing rules. So call them and get your answer that way! Good luck!

p.s. This reminds me, I need that training too!

Answer 3

You can either do the inservice yourself, or have someone from an outside service do it- it just has to meet the requirements of your state.  Usually, that entails documentation of some kind- showing who attended the staff meeting (a sign-in page will do), what information was covered, and a certificate of completion to attendants.  I would certainly check with your licensing agency to find out your state's requirements before doing the inservice.  I would recommend having someone from a mental health agency or even from a crisis center do the inservice, because they have the most experience in using the mandated reporter system. You can talk to your licensing agency, and they should be able to recommend an agency in your area that can do it.  When you book them for the inservice, make sure to tell them exactly what information you want covered... red flags, things to look for, the legalities of being a mandated reporter, how to report and to who, etc. so they know what information you really need to have covered.  In CA, we have to have Child/Adult abuse training annually, which is a great refresher.  Hopefully, as with disaster drills, this is something which you'll never have to do, but it is better to be prepared and know what the steps are than to have to scramble when the situation arises.

Answer 4

  Our Children and Youth agency (the people you report abuse to) came and trained us.  They had books, pre-test and post tests, video and pictures.  It was a very good training.  This is in Pa.  It is a required training because we are all mandated reporters.