About Stop It Now! Wisconsin

A new program working to prevent the sexual abuse of children in Wisconsin

Program Overview

Stop it Now! Wisconsin works to promote healthy and caring environments for children, safe from sexual abuse. Our mission is to prevent child sexual abuse by helping adults and communities take action to protect their children. Stop It Now! Wisconsin will provide our communities with hope:

• That all children can be safe from child sexual abuse.
• That every adult will take the responsibility to protect our children.
• That those who have concerning behaviors and those who may have hurt children can get treatment.

The start-up focus of Stop It Now! Wisconsin is on the adults who know youth with sexual behavior problems. Given the success in treatment of youth with sexual behavior problems, we believe that this population has the greatest potential for reducing the prevalence of child sexual abuse in Wisconsin.

Background

Stop It Now! Wisconsin is the result of Governor Jim Doyle’s Summit to Prevent Child Abuse and Neglect: A State Call to Action. The Wisconsin Children’s Trust Fund and the Child Abuse Prevention Fund of Children’s Hospital and Health System sponsored the April 2004 summit and the workgroups whose recommendations make up Wisconsin’s State Plan to Prevent Child Maltreatment. The Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Workgroup recommended the Stop It Now! model because of its focus on primary prevention – to intervene before a child is harmed.

Action plan

The goal of Stop It Now! Wisconsin is to empower adults to take action. The program will:

• Raise awareness of adult and community responsibility for child sexual abuse prevention.
• Educate adults and communities about high-risk situations and warning signs of potential abusers.
• Build skills and resources to respond appropriately when abuse is suspected.
• Increase the knowledge and understanding of healthy sexual development in children.
• Challenge those who are inappropriate or abusive, and families and friends who influence them, to seek help, stop the abuse, and face accountability.

Program Components and Milestones

• Established joint program leadership with guidance provided by a broad-based, 22-member statewide steering committee.
• Conducted a market research survey in Marathon and Milwaukee counties to gather baseline evaluation data and to guide program design.
• Participated in the PREVENT Institute, an intensive, 8-month leadership development and strategic planning program sponsored by the Center for Disease Control (CDC).
• Established local projects in Marathon and Milwaukee counties to implement community-based educational programs and test the Stop It Now! social marketing campaign.

Prevalence of Child Sex Abuse

• 88% of children who are sexually abused never disclose their abuse when they are still children. This means that most of our information about reported cases is limited to those children (12%) who are able to tell an adult and make a report.
• Knowing that most children do not report sexual abuse, in 2005 in Wisconsin, 11,358 alleged cases of child sexual abuse were reported. Only 3,576 were substantiated.
• Of these cases, 81% of child sexual abuse cases in Wisconsin involved family and extended family members or friends and neighbors.
• In this group, siblings or step-siblings were the offenders in 33% of the substantiated cases of child sexual abuse while 28% were peers.

A recent telephone survey of 803 adults in Marathon and Milwaukee counties found the following:

• 1 in 4 women and 1 in 8 men reported being sexually abused themselves as a child. This is higher th an the national average of 1 in 5 girls and 1 in 10 boys.
• 43% of adults who have suspected an adult they know could be sexually abusing children said they would do nothing or did not know what they could do.
• Although 97% of participants felt it is important for victims of child sexual abuse to get professional help, only 37% felt that adults who have abused children could stop these behaviors with the appropriate treatment.

The good news:

• People in Wisconsin already consider preventing the sexual abuse of children to be a significant issue:

• 90.1% of telephone survey respondents (9 out of 10 people) said that child sexual abuse was somewhat of a problem or a major problem in Wisconsin. (Click here for the full survey results.)

Collaborative Partners

Stop It Now! Wisconsin works with state and local partners. Many of these partners have representatives on the statewide steering committee. They include:

• Child Protection Center, Children’s Hospital and Health System
• Children’s Service Society of Wisconsin, Children’s Hospital and Health System
• The Healing Center of Milwaukee, Aurora Health System
• Midwest Center for Human Services, Milwaukee
• Milwaukee Wraparound
• The National Office of Stop It NOW!
• Prevent Child Abuse Wisconsin, Children’s Service Society of Wisconsin
• Sand Ridge Treatment Center
• Marathon County Child Advocacy Center
• Wisconsin Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers
• Wisconsin Coalition Against Sexual Assault
• Wisconsin Department of Administration
• Wisconsin Department of Corrections, Sex Offender Registration and Programs
• Wisconsin Department of Health and Family Services, the Family Violence Programs and the Division of Public Health
• Wisconsin Department of Justice
• Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

Sponsoring Organizations

Stop It Now! Wisconsin is co-sponsored by the Children’s Trust Fund and the Child Abuse Prevention Fund of Children’s Hospital and Health System. By adding Stop It Now! prevention strategies to both organizations’ array of statewide programs, the Children’s Trust Fund and the Child Abuse Prevention Fund have strengthened their commitment to preventing child maltreatment in Wisconsin.

The Wisconsin Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Board, also known as the Children’s Trust Fund is the state agency responsible for primary prevention of child maltreatment. For almost 25 years, the Children’s Trust Fund has promoted strength-based, universally accessible family resource and support programs. Through its publications and outreach to consumers, the Children’s Trust Fund seeks to raise public awareness about child development and positive parenting. The Governor-appointed Board also takes an active role in informing policymakers about the impact of legislation on children and families. (Click here to learn more about the Wisconsin Children’s Trust Fund.)

The Child Abuse Prevention Fund is a special initiative of Children’s Hospital and Health System. Created in 1988 to raise funds and grant out dollars, the mission of the Child Abuse Prevention Fund expanded into program- and community-capacity building, community awareness, and advocacy in the mid-1990s. The Child Abuse Prevention Fund has supported more than 140 nonprofit agencies in Wisconsin for primary prevention of child abuse and neglect programming. (Click here to learn more about the Child Abuse Prevention Fund.)

Stop It Now! Wisconsin
If you are concerned about a specific situation and would like to find out more about what you can do, please e-mail us at stopitnowwi@cssw.org or call the toll-free helpline at 1-888-PREVENT (1-888-773-8368). If you live in Wisconsin and would like more information about Stop It Now! Wisconsin, visit our web site at http://stopitnow.wi.gov.