Experience Exchange Fellowship Program
The program is designed to increase capacity to respond and prevent a large number of child sexual abuse and gender based violence in the Republic of Zambia.
Our Experience Exchange programs provide a unique opportunity to Zambian doctors, nurses, social workers, police officers, prosecutors, and forensics scientists to visit the San Francisco Bay Area. Duting the program they observe the local approach in the US medical, law enforcement, and non-profit organizations and agencies.
This has been an incredibly effective and engaging process. In 2013 we provided a unique opportunity for nine Zambian doctors, police officers, and forensic scientists (3 in each group) to engage in specially designed training and observation program in the USA.
As a result, Zambian police officers who participated in the Experience Exchange program in the USA in 2013 have trained another 140 police officers in Zambia in investigation and prosecution of child sexual abuse. Zambian doctors are handling very difficult child abuse cases. Zambian forensic scientists, after receiving intensive trainings at Sorenson Forensics laboratory in Utah are ready for the establishment of the first Zambian DNA forensic laboratory.
In 2014 we are planning to train Zambian prosecutors, magistrates and child advocacy specialists in the multidisciplinary team approach.
US Experts’ Mission in Zambia
It is extremely important to sustain and support the implementation of the new approaches and initiatives learned and observed during the Experience Exchange visits of Zambian specialists in the USA. Therefore we are initiating follow up missions of US professionals in Zambia to monitor the progress and provide training for larger groups of individuals.
Our volunteer Expert Advisors will provide trainings for groups of Zambian professionals in child advocacy, sexual assault examinations, investigation and prosecution of child abuse, child forensic interviewing, and many others.
Such missions also support the community connections between Zambian and American people. Many US organizations and individual professionals demonstrate their interest in supporting people of Zambia and other developing nations by sharing their knowledge and experience in response to child abuse and gender based violence.
Children’s Advocates Program
"Children’s Advocates" is a child-focused program in which representatives from many disciplines, including law enforcement, child protection, mental health, medical and child advocacy, work together to conduct interviews and make team decisions about investigation, management and prosecution of child abuse cases in the Republic of Zambia.
The Child Advocates will act as permanent monitors in depressed geographic areas in Lusaka (the Capital of Zambia) where children are subject to sexual abuse. The daily operation will enable mobile teams of the social workers (Child Advocates) to provide an immediate response to sexual assaults against children
We are initiating the Children’s Advocates program as a means of preventing child sexual abuse through intensive in the field monitoring and provide timely and effective abuse-response operations. Our Children’s Advocates teams will raise the effectiveness of HIV and AIDS post exposure prophylaxis treatment through rapid and mobile response. The advocate will continue monitoring the progress of the case through all the processes.
The key advantage of this initiative is that the Advocates will have direct access to the community, which will stimulate the exchange of information, and accessibility to the child victim. Another very important aspect of field monitoring is the ability to identify at-risk children and prevent their victimization by timely and effective intervention.