BYOD? Pitfalls to Using Your Own Device at Work

Employees often want to use their own electronic devices - cell phones, tablets, PCs, for work, but there are pitfalls.  Check out this article to learn about why BYOD to work may not be the best idea for the company or the employee.  http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/use-your-personal-smartphone-work-email-your-company-might-take-6C9558082#!

NOW OPEN: Advanced Management Institute

NOW OPEN: Advanced Management Institute
Dates: October 8th, October 29th, November 12th, November 26th
Midwest Regional CAC offers Advanced Management Institute in an online format.  As the environment for CACs continues to change, the demand for innovative management and governance is at a premium. This online course will explore topics such as; increasing board oversight, working with advisory boards, leadership vs management and creating evaluation outcomes. Each course module will consist of an hour presentation followed by discussion, exercises, feedback and suggestions for next steps.  For more information, go to http://www.mrcac.org/course/advanced-management-institute/

Linked In is More Than Just Networking

Linked In is one way to network with other people in your field or community, but did you know you can also follow topics and groups?  Here is an example of a discussion from the Board Source group, Too Little Board Deference to CEOs - Typical of Nonprofits?.  There is both a discussion of the problem and suggestions on how to improve the balance between boards and directors.  Check out the second link in the article for more information.

Millennials Support Causes, Not Institutions, Survey Finds

Millennials — young men and women born between 1979 and 1994 — passionately support causes rather than the institutions working to address them; are highly selective about which organizations to follow on social media; and value the intrinsic benefits of volunteering such as networking and gaining professional expertise, a new report from Achieve and the Case Foundation finds. Based on survey responses from more than twenty-six hundred individuals, the report, 2013 Millennial Impact Report (34 pages, PDF), found that 73 percent of millennials volunteered for a nonprofit organization in 2012. When asked about their motivations, 79 percent said they were passionate about the cause or issue, 67 percent felt they could make a difference for a cause they cared about, and 56 percent wanted to connect and network with like-minded people. The survey also found that in a crowded and noisy media landscape, 49 percent of millennials actively follow one to five nonprofits on social media, 80 percent like it best when nonprofits have mobile-friendly Web sites, and 59 percent like receiving news or action-oriented updates with links to more information and next steps. Now in its fourth year, the annual survey also found that 84 percent of millennials prefer to give online and are most likely to donate when they feel inspired by the organization (69 percent) or when the organization provides specific examples of the impact the donation will have on its work (49 percent). And while millennials in general are not yet in a position to give large amounts, more than eight in ten (83 percent) made a donation in 2012, while 52 percent said they would consider signing up for a monthly giving program. "Millennials are a little bit different in that they're much more focused on the cause and not the specific organization," Jean Case, CEO of the Case Foundation, told the Nonprofit Quarterly. "From a strategy standpoint...it really should encourage collaboration....I think we saw a very clear message: the need for organizations and causes to be really authentic to drive action by millennials." "2013 Millennial Impact Report." Achieve and Case Foundation Report 7/18/13. Creedon, Aine. "An Interview With Jean Case on the 2013 Millennial Impact Report." Nonprofit Quarterly 7/18/13. Taken from Philanthropy News Digest  July 23, 2013   The Foundation Center.

Stuart House Article a Great Discription of the CAC Model at Work

Congratulations to Stuart House in Santa Monica, CA for the great article in the LA times!  What a wonderful description of the work you do and the benefit of the CAC model. You can find the article at:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-beat-stuart-house-20130709-dto,0,2102975.htmlstory

Webinars on Trauma-Informed Practice

Registration Open for Child Protective Services Webinar Series From June to August 20, 2013, the National Resource Center for Child Protective Services—a service of the Children’s Bureau, Department of Health and Human Services—will host the Webinar series, “Safety Organized, Trauma-Informed, Solution-Focused Approach to Domestic Violence Cases in Child Protection.” Presenters will share current knowledge to enhance the work of child protection professionals, including strategies for family engagement and family-centered safety and case planning. Resources: Register for “What Is a Safety Organized, Trauma-Informed, Solution-Focused Approach to Domestic Violence Cases in Child Protection?” taking place on June 18, 3–4:30 p.m. ET. Register for “Safety Organized, Trauma-Informed, and Solution-Focused Domestic Violence Practice in CPS: Engaging Families To Promote Change,” taking place on July 16, 3–4:30 p.m. ET. Register for “Trauma-Informed and Solution-Focused Domestic Violence Practice in CPS: Safety Planning and Case Planning,” taking place on August 20, 3–4:30 p.m. ET.

Services for Sexually Abused Incarcerated Youth

Webinar To Discuss Services for Sexually Abused Incarcerated Youth On May 1, 2013, at 2 p.m. ET, Just Detention International (JDI), in conjunction with the Office on Violence Against Women, will present “Safe and Secure: Providing Services for Incarcerated Youth.” During the 90-minute Webinar, presenters will discuss services addressed in the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) standards, review the challenges of providing care in detention, examine ways to adapt crisis interventions to these settings, and offer strategies for providing the community standard of care to youth detainees. Resources: Registration information is available online. This is the final Webinar in a series from JDI. Access presentation materials from the first two Webinars: "One in Eight: The Reality of Sexual Abuse in Youth Detention” and “Connections: Working Together To Stop Sexual Abuse in Youth Detention.” Visit the National PREA Resource Center, a central repository for information, best practices, and research on preventing and responding to prison rape.

Happy Fails To You

Why take time to consider our mistakes? Because we learn from them.  As the songwriters have often said, it is in the places that we are broken that the light shines through.  Engineers Without Borders, a Canadian non-profit, publishes an annual Failure Report.  Although this is an international organization, there is much our local, regional, and statewide organizations can glean from these reports about communication, failure to get buy-in, relationship building, and thinking about the ramifications of our actions.  Any of those issues sound familiar?  You can read some of EWB's Failure Reports at http://dxpj7nxwqticg.cloudfront.net/wp-content/themes/whiteboard/reports/EWB%20-%20Failure%20Report%202012.pdf

If you are considering the value of this approach for your organization, Failforward.org offers a free download of Failure Report  A How-To-Guide at http://failforward.org/learning-modules/failure-reports/

The information provided in this blog is intended to help readers access a wide variety of information related to the work of Children's Advocacy Centers and should not be seen as an endorsement of any particular model or approach and does not necessarily reflect the views of Western Regional CAC, Safe Passage CAC, or OJJDP.

Is there a link between bruises in infancy and later severe abuse?

Is there a link between early bruises in infants and later severe abuse?  Read more here.
http://healthland.time.com/2013/03/12/how-small-bruises-lead-to-big-ones-in-child-abuse-cases/

Terrifying Site Visits

Vu Lee, Executive Director of Vietnam Friendship Association in Seattle, shares his humorous and insightful take on living through a potential funder site visit.  Been there, done that.
http://blueavocado.org/content/humor-uncomfortable-terrifying-site-visit

Mandated Reporter Training - Is it happening in your local schools?

In some states, there are inconsistencies and confusion within school districts about mandated reporter policies and a lack of consistent training for staff, raising the risk that child abuse goes unreported.  As a CAC, schools may be a good place to partner with for mandated reporter training.  You can read an article about the problem with California schools here:

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_22749685/school-abuse-reporting-training-murky-despite-horrifying-cases


The information provided in this blog is intended to help readers access a wide variety of information related to the work of Children's Advocacy Centers and should not be seen as an endorsement of any particular model or approach and does not necessarily reflect the views of Western Regional CAC, Safe Passage CAC, or OJJDP.

Financial Assistance Available To Attend Trainings

Later in the year, Western Regional CAC will offer scholarships to attend professional trainings and conferences other than those conducted by WRCAC.  In the meantime, or in addition, consider applying for one of these scholarships:

The Office for Victims of Crime offers professional development scholarships to those who work with victims of crime. Scholarships can be applied toward the expenses for travel and per diem and for training fees or tuition. For more information and to apply for a scholarship, visit the OVC TTAC Web site. (OVC) For example, you would like to send a team member to the NCA Leadership Conference, the Dallas Crimes Against Children Conference, or any other professional conference.  You could apply to WRCAC for up to $1000 toward travel and transportation and up to another $1000 from Office of Victim of Crime to pay for registration and additional travel and transportation costs.  Both are competitive grants, but come up with a compelling case and you could have the funds you need.  OVC also has grants for up to $5000 per training for multidisciplinary teams.

New Video Series: Through Our Eyes: Children, Violence and Truama

The Office for Victims of Crime announced the release of a new video series titled Through Our Eyes: Children, Violence, and Trauma. This series includes a public awareness video and three topic-specific videos—Treatments That Work, The Child Advocacy Center Model, and Community-Based Approaches. More videos are forthcoming.  You can find the videos and other related materials at
http://www.ovc.gov/pubs/ThroughOurEyes/index.html

Congratulations to the Sonoma County Redwood Children's Center in Santa Rosa, CA, Safe Harbor in Ventura, CA and Safe Harbor East in Simi Valley, CA for their successful re-accreditation. Thanks for doing such a great job for the kids in your communities.

TechSoup Offerings Mean Big Savings

TechSoup.org offers a variety of products to qualifying organizations for a minimal administrative fee.  Two examples available right now:

• GrantStation - an online search engine to help you find funders  (register Feb. 12 - 13th only.  $99/year - normal retail rate $699)
•  MS Office 2013 - the newest version of the Office Suite.  Standard $24  Professional Plus $32

TechSoup also offers blogs, articles, and workshops on how to best use technology for your non-profit organization.  To find out more, go to: www.techsoup.org

Some tips on engaging your board in fundraising from Nell Edington (taken from the Social Vilocity Blog, www.socialvilocity.net):

I’ll admit it, I’ve been on a board fundraising kick lately in the blog (here and here). I just think that if your nonprofit is going to become more strategic and financially sustainable, you have to start from the beginning (or the top, as it were). In my last blog post I discussed how to overcome excuses for why a board member can’t bring money in the door. But the fact remains that a majority of people don’t like to (or simply won’t) ask for money.
The good news is that there are lots of other things board members can do to bring money in the door. And remember, if you are financing not fundraising your organization, your definition of “bringing money in the door” should be very broad.
Here are 9 things you could ask your fundraising-shy board members to do:

1. Help create or evaluate a business plan for an earned income venture. If you have business leaders or entrepreneurs on your board this would be a great use of their time and add tremendous value to your organization. If they can help you create a more profitable business, they are directly contributing to your organization’s bottom-line.



2. Advocate for government money. You may have a board member that can’t stand the idea of asking their friends for money, but they are well connected in city, county, state or federal government and could open doors to you for government contracts, grants, fee-for-service or other government monies.



3. Provide intelligence on prospects. If you have a board member that seems to know everyone in town, but for whatever reason refuses to ask any of them for money, they can still be incredibly useful. You may be getting ready to ask a prospective donor for $1,000, and this board member can tell you what that person has already given to, at what level, who else might know them and so on. When you make an ask, the more information you have going into it, the more successful you will be.



4. Set up a meeting with a prospective customer. If your nonprofit is engaged in an earned income venture, you probably always need help with new sales. If you have a board member who is part of, or connected to, the target customer(s) of your business, they could open doors to new customers. Or at the very least, they could help you think through your sales and marketing strategies and make them more effective so that you can attract more customers.



5. Email, call or visit a donor just to say thanks. The stewardship of a gift is an often forgotten, but incredibly critical, part of the fundraising process. According to Penelope Burk’s annual donor survey, 84% of donors would give again if they were thanked in a timely way. And being thanked by a board member is a bonus. A donor who renews their gift to a nonprofit is providing more money for the organization.



6. Explain to a prospect why you serve. A board of directors is a group of volunteers who care so much about the mission of the organization that they are willing to donate their time (a precious resource) to the cause. As a donor, it is affirming to see that a volunteer is contributing time, but it is even more motivating to hear, in the board member’s own words, why they feel compelled to serve this organization. That story can be enough to convince someone to give.



7. Host a small gathering at your home. Over the course of a year, most people invite a gathering of friends and/or family into their home at least once. A board member could take a few minutes at their next dinner party, birthday celebration or Super Bowl feast to talk about something that is near and dear to their heart: the nonprofit on whose board they serve. They don’t have to ask people for money, but they could simply say, “If you’re interested in learning more, let me know.” And then the nonprofit’s staff could take it from there with those who are interested.



8. Recruit an in-kind service. If a board member could remove an expense line item from a nonprofit’s budget that would directly contribute to a stronger bottom-line. For example, if a board member works at an ad agency, could they convince their company to provide some pro-bono marketing services to their nonprofit? But keep in mind, these in-kind donations must be of value to the nonprofit and provide an offset to a direct cost that the nonprofit would otherwise have to bear.



9. Negotiate a lower price from a vendor. Do you have a board member with great negotiating skills (think of all of those lawyers on your board). Could they negotiate with your insurance providers, office space rental company, or printers, for a lower price? If so, that’s more money in the bank.

If you think of a board member’s “get” responsibilities in these much broader terms, then I find it difficult to imagine a board member who cannot bring money in the door. You just have to get strategic about how each individual board member can best contribute to the organization’s bottom-line.

Get Your Facebook Friends to Spread Your Message

Wouldn't it be nice if you could get all those folks who have "liked" you on Facebook to spread the word about the great work you are doing or about your upcoming fundraising campaign?  A new app lets you do just that.  DonateYourAccount.com has an app that enables your Facebook pals to donate their account to your cause so it will automatically re-post your most recent posting. 

The person donating their account remains in control of who sees the re-posting, how often things post to their account, and can withdraw their account at any time.  Your agency doesn't have access to their Facebook account, the donor's account just automatically re-posts for you.

This new method of social marketing lets you reach out to a group of potential supporters that you may not have otherwise had a way of accessing.  Sure, some of the groups listed include Torres v. Zombies, but there are also nonprofit groups with a local interest like Boys and Girls Club of Hampshire County. 

You can also have people donate their Twitter account.  To find out more, go to www.donateyouraccount.com.

The information provided in this blog is intended to help readers access a wide variety of information related to the work of Children's Advocacy Centers and should not be seen as an endorsement of any particular model or approach and does not necessarily reflect the views of Western Regional CAC, Safe Passage CAC, or OJJDP.

Web Forum To Discuss Services for Runaway Youth and Human Trafficking Victims

On January 22, 2013, at 12 p.m. E.T., the Office for Victims of Crime (OVC) and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention will cosponsor a 1-hour Web Forum discussion on best practices for providing services to runaway youth and victims of human trafficking. Fiona Mason and Danny Stewart of Safe Horizon will co-host the session. Questions for the guest hosts may be submitted prior to the event. OVC’s HELP for Victim Service Providers Web Forum provides an opportunity for victim service providers and allied professionals to share best and promising practices for addressing victim issues.   Resources: View instructions on how to participate. Submit questions in advance of the forum. Session hosts will answer these questions during the live discussion. Access transcripts for past sessions and read the message boards. To learn more about training and technical assistance resources available from OJJDP in the areas of missing children, visit the Web sites of the AMBER Alert Training and Technical Assistance Program and the Missing and Exploited Children’s Program. To read on recent progress in addressing child sex trafficking in the United States, visit the Web site of OJJDP’s Safe Start Center.

Overview of Evidence-based Trauma-informed Treatment Models

The Fall 2012 Virginia Child Protection Newsletter provides a nice overview of evidence-based, trauma-focused treatment for children and families.  You can find it at:
http://psychweb.cisat.jmu.edu/graysojh/pdfs/Volume95.pdf