The OC Child Safety Program enables OC to fulfill its biblical, ethical, and legal responsibility of protecting the children it its care, guarding their safety and well-being, as well as helping members protect their integrity in how they interact with and treat children.
Everyone Working Together to Protect Children.
If you become aware of any concerns regarding the safety of a children, please either send an email to childsafety@oci.org or contact your supervisors right away (within 24 hours). Your prompt action may prevent a child from being harmed.
OC is a member of the Child Safety and Protection Network (CSPN), which is a collaborative network of mission agencies, faith-based NGOs and International Christian schools intentionally and strategically addressing the issues of child protection.
Partnership with the Child Safety & Protection Network (CSPN) provides One Challenge and its Child Safety Team access to a myriad of helpful resources regarding child safety issues as well as connections to child safety individuals around the world.
This ongoing connection is vital for OC’s child safety program to remain current with changes in practices and protocols and up to date with the latest child safety issues. This connection provides critical and timely partnering options through child safety situations.
Write to childsafety@oci.org or tell your supervisor asap (OC personnel).
Raising a concern allows the Child Safety Team to address a potential issue that could harm a child or multiple children.
IF a situation is discovered where a child has been harmed, then appropriate action will be taken by the mission leadership to address the matter.
The Child Safety Advocate (CSA) will meet with other members of the CS Team and conduct an initial assessment of the situation. The CSA will also inform any decision-making leaders.
The CS Team will decide if further information needs to be gathered or if there are action steps that can be taken to prevent the child or children from being harmed. Many times there is a quick and simple solution to keeping a child safe. Sometimes it is a more involved process, taking time to gather more information, etc. The ultimate goal is to prevent harm from happening to children.
More questions? Write to childsafety@oci.org.
The Child Safety Advocate (currently Tom Hardeman) receives the emails initially and then processes them with other members of the CS Team, depending upon the level of response needed.
We are seeing the need to be proactive and to that end we are establishing the Child Safety Program for OC. Many mission organizations in recent years have had significant issues with child safety concerns. We want to do all that we can to prevent harm or abuse from happening to children.
OC personnel can access this manual on the internal website. Ask your supervisor of assistance, if needed. For other interested parties, please contact the Child Safety Advocate at childsafety@oci.org.
As of 8.31.23 the CS Team consists of: Child Safety Advocate – Tom Hardeman; Child Safety Specialists: Kelli Boesel, Regina Makaiwi, Joshua Oh, Hannah Sparkman. Coming soon: Area Child Safety Specialists – Asia: Tracie Schultz, Europe: Tammy Lundell
We need for everybody in the mission to be aware and observant for potential areas of harm to children.
This is one of the best ways for us to prevent harm from happening. Even though you may not work with children, you are most likely to be around children in various settings. The guidelines presented in the Child Safety Program are designed to help adults make healthy choices in the way they engage or interact with children in any setting. In this way we hope to do everything we can to keep our children safe.
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