Letter to the Crown Heights community:
All of us have heard too many sad stories about kids and abuse. We wring our hands in despair and wish the difficult and awkward story would go away. How can we stop this awful pain? What preventative steps can we take to protect our children?
Now we are taking a positive step. We will empower the children and educate them so that they know the boundaries of personal safety and what to do in an unsafe situation. This fall, Crown Heights mosdos will invest in our children’s fundamental human right to a safe and secure childhood. Safety Kid® is coming to town.
The Safety Kid® Child Safety program was created and developed by the Aleinu Family Resource Center, a program of the Jewish Family Service of Los Angeles. Designed specifically for the frum community, Safety Kid™ teaches kids from a positive and tznius perspective how to protect themselves from all types of danger they may encounter.
The program was initiated by the Merkos Chinuch Office, which formed a parent committee who has worked hard to bring this long overdue program to all our Lubavitch pre-schools and elementary schools in Crown Heights.
During the week of October 28, 2012, Aleinu representatives will hold workshops and training sessions for Crown Heights School staff, administrators, teachers, and all community parents. Volunteer educators will be trained by Aleinu to go into the classrooms once a year and to teach the students using upbeat, fun and interactive materials, how to protect themselves from physical abuse.
The program also covers other areas of safety like “stranger danger”, fire safety, school bullying, what to do when lost or separated from parents, as well as other vital day to day safety practices.
Mandatory evening parent workshops will also be held to increase awareness and prevention. Parent participation is vital. Each child will receive a Safety Kid® kit to take home and review with their parents.
Together with the children, the safety practices they learn at school will be reinforced at home. “Tell Mommy what the Safety Morah taught you today, show me your “safety tree” and we will fill it in together”. “Mommy is so happy that you checked first before you answered the front door, etc.”
Our kids must know from a very young age what is an “OK” or not “OK” touch. They must know that they can and must always come to mommy and tell her that someone did something to them that made them uncomfortable or scared.
This New Year, we will make a hachlata together and show our children that their safety is our utmost priority. More information and scheduling details will IY”H be forthcoming. The significant fee for the Safety Kid® program is being shared by our schools and the Chinuch Office.
With much thanks,
Crown Heights Parent Safety Alliance
studies show bullying is far more destructive to the psychi than most cases of other abuse!!
we need as many resources in this area as possible. We work hard to do Torah and Mitzvos and we need to have supports to keep our lives healthy bruchnius, bgoshmius, and in all areas of mental and physical health. this is a good start
i agree with number 4
uh, how old r u??
thanx to all who are organizing this!
Beis Rivkah , Beis Yaakov & other svchools in MTL.had these workshops which a frum lady gave for the children. It was called T.O.P.S. Topics On Personal Safety.
Her name is Raizy Weissman & the kids learned alot from this.
I hope this will truly help to eradicate problems of child abuse in our community!!
I agree with ur points
Just to add an important often overlooked source of abuse peer to peer bullying Rampant in Some of our bigger schools
a combined effort to get child pedophiles off the street and into the prison system.
what if the abusers are mommy or daddy?
we must teach our kids what to do then.
most abuse is not stranger abuse, but abuse from parents, siblings, and other family members.
what if the teacher in the school or the principle is the abuser?
hopefully, these problems will be confronted, because they are by far the most common source of abuse.
for all your hard work!
just a shame the name could not be a little more conservative. ‘kid Safety’ sound a bit to cheap, as if were working overtime to be hip.
This is a Great thing
But can people work on putting the right tools in love for our kids like good teachers.