What is your favorite part about your job?
My passion for advocating for the most vulnerable in our community first began when I was 14 years old; I volunteered for the domestic violence program where my mother worked. Later, I worked for that same program for 12 years – first as a child advocate and later as a legal advocate. My mother is now the Shelter Administrator for that program while I serve as a Child Sex Trafficking/High-Risk Youth (CST/HRY) Care Coordinator for Dallas Children’s Advocacy Center (DCAC). One of my favorite parts of my job is sharing a love for helping others and giving back to our community. With my mother as a role model, it’s pretty much in my blood.
What is your role within the agency?
In my role as a CST/HRY Care Coordinator, I specialize in coordinating cases that involve children in Dallas County who have experienced trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation or who are at high risk of being exploited. Care Coordinators fill an essential role – we are the central point of contact for the numerous systems involved in bringing justice and healing to CST/HRY victims. Law enforcement, prosecution, anti-trafficking advocates, Child Protective Services (CPS), juvenile detention, and therapeutic services are just some of the different entities I work with on CST/HRY cases. Interagency collaboration of these disciplines is essential to the successful outcomes for CST/HRY victims, and Care Coordinators like myself help ensure this happens by sharing the most updated information between agencies and ensuring that every child victim receives a trauma-informed service plan tailored to meet their unique needs. It truly takes a village.
What does an average day look like for you?
As a CST/HRY Care Coordinator, a large part of my day consists of reviewing my caseload. Currently, I have 22 clients assigned to me. Each case progresses through a Continuum of Care for a minimum of 90 days, during which I will gather updates from DCAC’s partners on their efforts to address that client’s short and long-term needs as well as assist with minimizing any barriers to service each case may face. I facilitate team calls with the various agencies involved to create a joint service plan that holds each member of the team accountable for that child’s needs.
Children who are runaways are especially vulnerable to trafficking, so another aspect of my role involves the recovery of runaways by law enforcement. Our team is on-call 24/7 to respond to these recoveries (also referred to as a “Rapid Response”), which are called in on a hotline by law enforcement.
When a child is recovered from a trafficking situation, my entire day might consist of working on that one case. I will gather information on the child and contact all the partners needed. The purpose of Rapid Response is to restore stability and safety for the child through completing a forensic interview, crisis intervention, safety planning, medical evidence collection, a recovery team meeting, and finding placement for the victim. A Rapid Response may take up to 72 hours from beginning to end, and the Care Coordinator is responsible for ensuring the process is victim-centered and trauma-informed.
Why is Child Abuse Prevention Month important?
Child Abuse Prevention Month is a great opportunity to educate our communities on the horrendous issue of the trafficking of children, which is another form of child abuse. Talking about the trafficking of children makes many people uncomfortable, especially those not familiar with this issue. It is something most people don’t even want to think about, much less acknowledge that it happens to children in our own communities and schools, but it is a stark reality we cannot ignore. I am sometimes asked how I can do the type of work I do. Knowing that there are children who are experiencing such abuse and suffering, I cannot imagine doing anything else.
To learn more about DCAC’s MDT Coordination Team and the services they provide, visit https://dcac.org/what-we-do/mdt/.
