The Diocese of Peoria this month implements a new “safe environment”
training program for adult employees and volunteers who work with children and young people.

The Diocesan Safe Environment Program consists of one-hour sessions
in a PowerPoint format, designed to help adults identify the signs that a
child might be a victim of abuse or an adult might be an abuser, according to Jeanne Whalen, director of the Office of Pastoral Services in the diocesan Office of Family Life.

The new program emphasizes that adults working in Catholic schools,
parishes and agencies are role models of the Catholic faith with a responsibility to safeguard children and young people.

“We want all adults who work with children to be representatives of
Christ in our parishes and schools,” said Jerry Sanderson, associate superintendent for Catholic schools, who will conduct training workshops for safe environment program facilitators on Aug. 7-8.

Safe environment training for diocesan and parish employees and volunteers is a key mandate of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, passed by the U.S. bishops in 2002. Since that time, the Diocese of Peoria has required all employees and volunteers to be trained through “Protecting God’s Children,” one of the Virtus programs distributed by the National Catholic Risk Retention Group.

Every new employee or volunteer working for the diocese or a parish will be required to complete a safe environment session. Those who have already been certified through Protecting God’s Children
will not have to go through the new program.

Since Protecting God’s Children has been in place, each year more than
900 employees and volunteers have completed the program, and about
that many are expected to be certified under the new program in the coming year.

Two workshops have been scheduled to introduce facilitators to the new program. These “training of trainers” workshops will be held at two locations: on Thursday, Aug. 7, at Central Catholic High School in
Bloomington, and on Friday, Aug. 8, at Costa Catholic Academy in
Galesburg. Both sessions will run from 9:30 to 11 a.m.

At the workshop, school principals and other facilitators will learn about
the new training program and how it will be implemented in the parishes,
schools and agencies of the diocese. More than 200 facilitators are scheduled to be trained during the month of August.