Mission and Activities

Our mission is to promote the optimal development of children and families by leading Washington State in its efforts to prevent child abuse and neglect. In fulfilling this mission the council undertakes a few key activities outlined below.

• Manage the Children's Trust Fund for Washington State.
• Develop a statewide network of community-based programs to support families and promote healthy child development.
• Fund 30 community-based family resource programs throughout Washington State. Local programs match these dollars with local resources.
• Collaborate with statewide partners to provide training and peer-to-peer support opportunities for volunteers, parent leaders and staff of local programs focusing on family support practice and outcome evaluation.
• Provide technical assistance and information to community leaders, local programs, and policymakers on research, best practices and family support programs in communities throughout Washington.
• Collaborate with local programs to evaluate program outcomes and facilitate continuous quality improvement.
• Co-sponsor (with Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center) of the Shaken Baby Syndrome Prevention public awareness campaign, a statewide public awareness campaign to increase awareness about the effects of shaking infants and young children.
• Market the Keep Kids Safe Special License Plates and Heirloom Birth Certificates to increase funding for the Washington Children’s Trust Fund.

Strategic Plan

The Washington Council for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect, in its efforts to fight child abuse and neglect, offer this strategic plan that will allow highly measurable results and achieve a deep community impact.

Objectives

• Increase awareness and understanding of solutions to the problem of child abuse and neglect by improving availability of and access to current prevention information and strategies.
• Enhance community capacity* to respond to the needs of children by implementing effective child abuse and neglect prevention strategies.
• Reduce systemic barriers to effective child abuse and neglect prevention by enhancing resources and improving policies.

* “Capacity describes the mix of conditions (shared values, quality of programs and strategies, program congruence with community needs, and political support) and resources (knowledge, skills, money, time and technical assistance) necessary for communities and community coalitions to accomplish and sustain change.” The Future of Public Health in the 21st Century, Inst. of Medicine, 2003.

National Affiliations
We are involved in prevention efforts at the national level through our partnership with the National Alliance of Children’s Trust and Prevention Funds and as a state chapter of Prevent Child Abuse America.

These affiliations strengthen our access to national expertise and resources to share with our partners in Washington State. In addition, these affiliations make sure that Washington State is well-represented in prevention work on the national level. They also benefit our state by ensuring that we are proactively engaging in the latest prevention research, understanding how best to reframe child abuse and neglect, accessing new funding streams and sharing what we know and what we’ve learned with advocates and policy makers.