Child Protection

Child Safeguarding, by definition, includes all activities an organisation undertakes to ensure that its co-workers, operations, and Programmes do no harm to children and do not expose them to the risk of harm and abuse; that appropriate responses and effective management of child safeguarding concerns are in place; and that any concerns the organisation has about children’s safety in its own Programmes and within the communities they work in are reported to the appropriate authorities.
At SOS Children’s villages, we concentrate on four main Child Safeguarding Principles:
2. CREATING AND MAINTAINING A SAFE ENVIRONMENT – PREVENTION: Provide guidance on how to safeguard children from abuse. The focus is on implementing suitable human resource recruitment and development approaches. Combined with this, it is essential that we listen carefully to children, take their views seriously, encourage them to participate in discussions on child protection issues, and offer them the opportunity to build trust-filled relationships. It is clear that child abuse is less likely to occur within a context that fosters child participation at all levels.
- The SOS Children’s Villages roots, vision, mission and values
- The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC)
- Experience and inputs of stakeholders from various SOS Children’s Villages Associations including children who are important stakeholders.
- The standards on child protection as defined by the Keeping Children Safe Coalition.
Child safety is everybody’s business
Which other reporting channels can I use to report a child safeguarding incident?
- inform the child safeguarding team in the respective programme;
- if it is not possible to contact any member of the child safeguarding team in the programme, please report your concerns directly to the national child safeguarding focal person;
- if it is not possible to contact the national child safeguarding focal person, the report should be forwarded to any other member of the national child safeguarding team including the ND as the chairperson of the national child safeguarding team;
- if due to any reason this is also not possible, the report should be shared with the child safeguarding focal person in the regional office.
Why should I report a child safety concern or incident?
What kind of incidents can I report here?
CHILD ABUSE: WHAT IS CHILD ABUSE?
Specific considerations:
- the recognition that a child who has abused another child differs significantly from adults who have committed similar offences, as the child is not fully aware of why he or she has committed abuse and what the consequences are
- keeping in mind that the best interest of the child is the primary consideration in all decisions made - for both the victim and the abuser.