Journal of Child and Youth Care

My daughter was having trouble in school when she was only six years old. All year long she told me how she didn't feel good about her teacher. They never seemed to connect and much as I would try, going to meetings, asking the teacher what was going on, we weren't able to figure out what was wrong. Finally the year ended and we looked forward to another teacher and another opportunity.

Summer progressed. One day my daughter came to me and said ‘I know what was wrong with my teacher last year’. I listened curiously, aware that she had obviously been thinking about this for some time.

‘All year long,’ she said, ‘he never touched me. Not once. I thought he didn't like me.’

And this from a six year old child.

We all need to be touched. It is part of being human. It is part of how we form attachments. It is part of how we, as a race of people, express caring. It is one of the ways in which we say to another person `you are of value, you are important, you are worthy of being cared for'. It is a part of our culture and the reality of the world we live in. I could quote to you the studies but you already know that this is true. Besides, you've read the literature about the importance of human touch in facilitating development, about the feeling of isolation and rejection which people experience when touch is withheld, about how touch is a necessary component in developing experiences of attachment or, about how touch is one of the ways in which we experience ‘connectedness’ with one another.

So, what are we doing? Why are we insisting in behaving in a manner that we know is contrary to the growth and development of the youth in our care? Because we are afraid? Because we are unable or unwilling to do our job? Because we don't know what else to do?

There is another way. A way that protects children from the inappropriate among us and still meets their needs. A way that protects staff and still meets the needs of those in our care. There is a better way, but it requires courage.

One of our major tasks is to create environments of safety and security for young people; environments of trust within which they can learn to relax, let go of their fear, discover new possibilities for being in relationship and move on to a different phase of their life, hopefully with less pain and greater confidence. So, lets start there. Let's create environments of trust where they, and we, can feel assured that young people will be treated with dignity and respect and not have to worry about someone taking advantage of them. Let's create environments where we can be assured that touch is about health, not abuse. Let's take our responsibility seriously. How? In no particular order, here are a few ideas.

1. Hire people who can be trusted to be with young people.
There are tools available to help us do this. It means, of course, that all new employees have to be carefully screened. There are child abuse potential tests, police checks, hiring procedures that select in people with the characteristics associated with being good youth care workers, psychological tests which screen out people who have difficulty with power and power in relationships and, personality profiles which pinpoint people with distorted views of people, youth and relationships. There are in-depth interviews which can be focused on who you are and how you are in relationship rather than where you went to school, where you worked, and what you know theoretically. And finally, take reference checks seriously. Ask difficult questions of the person making the reference, like were there ever times when s/he struggled with issues of power in relationship with youth or; when personal business and needs came up, what did the staff person do? Trust and the therapeutic relationship go hand in hand; both are essential components of effective youth care work. Youth need to be able to trust the people who are working with them and to feel confident that trust will not be violated. The characteristic of `being trustworthy' belongs in the hiring process. Screening people in to, or out of, the field does not guarantee the safety of youth. It is not enough to implement screening and then just sit back and say ‘Oh, All our staff are screened’. It does not provide another easy way out for those who would not take other measures. It is not the escape from responsibility some would make it appear. It is only one piece of the solution, not the solution itself.

2. Provide appropriate supervision, both scheduled and on-the-floor.
Supervision lets the supervisor know how the staff are being in relationship with young people and this has to be the most important element. After all, most inappropriate touch happens in the context of a relationship, and ‘in relationship’ is where we see the elements on the inappropriate use of power, the deference or compliance of youth, and the distortion of boundaries between young people and workers. This supervision, however, cannot just be of the common garden variety taking place behind closed doors away from the relationship between youth and workers. It must also be of the ‘on-the-floor’, ‘while they are interacting’ variety where the supervisor actually sees what is going on, not just hears about it screened through the experiential frame of the worker. Appropriate supervision provides an additional set of eyes watching what is going on between youth and staff; sometimes in the morning, sometimes in the day; and sometimes late in to the night. But supervision does more than watch. It also provides support for the worker, a place to sort out the sometimes confusing experiences the worker has with the youth, a place to process feelings, thoughts, and actions. A place to check in, to be sure, to be safe. And a place for the supervisor to monitor the interactions between youth and staff. Supervision and safety go hand in hand.

3. Have a zero tolerance policy with regard to disrespect.
Disrespect is not just about abuse. Respect or disrespect is in the little things, like labeling, disregarding opinions, being inappropriately abrupt in responding to someone, or not seeking input. Disrespect is about power. It is about whether or not we believe that ‘other’ has power in this relationship. When staff treat youth with disrespect, they signal to the youth that the youth is of no value, or only as much value as the ‘dis-respecter’ cares to award to the youth. In our work with young people we should tolerate no disrespect towards the youth. They have frequently come from worlds in which they were de-valued, or disrespected, on a daily basis. We don't want to continue this experience for them. It is contrary to the very purpose of our work: healing. When people are hired in to this work, our expectations and guidelines should be made extremely clear, just as they are if someone is going to work in medicine, education or any other field. There are certain protocols which apply — if, for example, you are going to work in an operating room, there are clear expectations about dress, hygiene and performance and if you are going to work with youth, there are protocols regarding self, relationship and respect which apply. Once the guidelines are clear it is reasonable to expect people to follow them. If a person cannot find it in themselves to follow such guidelines, they should be working someplace else.

4. Create climates where youth speak up if they don't ‘feel good’.
Young people in care sometimes speak of the group care environment, or relationships with helpers, as a place where ‘nobody listens anyway’. Sometimes young people talk of having tried to tell someone something difficult only to have the worker focus on some aspect of the form of communication rather than the content. If they aren’t being heard, why should they speak? We need to create environments of trust, support and the opportunity to be heard. It is not enough to say we listen. We must also have vehicles, formal and informal, for youth to communicate their concerns to us. Group meetings, individual conversations, complaint procedures, abuse reporting procedures, peer advocates: these are a few of the options available to us. And we need to make sure that youth and staff know how to use these resources; that they are clear, accessible and useful. We also have to be careful of a sometimes unfortunate tendency to disregard what youth have to say because the youth ‘is a liar’ or has ‘made unproven accusations before’. Just because it was not proven last time, does not mean it did not happen this time. Each complaint needs to be reviewed in its own light. But most importantly, youth must know that someone is hearing what they have to say and the best way that I know of to create that experience is to do something when youth bring a concern to you. It doesn't have to be a big concern. It could be about the menu, the types of activities, their experiences at work, their concerns about another youth, feelings about how they are treated at school. We start with the `everyday'. Once youth experience us as listening to their everyday concerns, they may come to think we will listen about the other, bigger things; like not feeling good or safe with someone on staff.

5. Teach staff how to read, respect, and respond to feedback from touches.
Feedback is all around us. It is in the little things that people do: how they move; the look on their faces; the slight hesitations in their speech. Unfortunately, we don’t always pay close attention and, even when we do, we often assume that we know what is going on, what is meant by the feedback we experience. Seeing the feedback, for example, is one thing. It simply requires that we be observant and know what we are looking for. Respecting it, however, means that we must be interpreting it accurately. And that requires help in interpretation; help from the person who is giving the feedback. So, one of the things people need to know how to do, is how to ask for help in interpreting the feedback. Like when I touch a youth and the youth shies away. If I don’t ask for the youth for help in interpretation I might assume the youth is frightened, or shy, or physically uncomfortable, or any one of a number of things. When I ask for help in interpreting the reaction, however, I may come closer in my understanding of the meaning of the youth's action. Once I am confident that my interpretation of the feedback is more accurate, I am in a position to respond to the real meaning of the feedback, not just my own speculation about what it means. The bonus to this approach of checking out meaning, is that youth may come to realize that you care about what they experience, and what their experience means. This, in turn, opens up the door for more difficult discussions and sets the stage for you to be wondering with them, what their behavior means. Finally, if a youth seems to express an avoidance to being around a certain person, we need to ask why.

6. Make psychological safety and security a priority for staff and youth.
Often in working with troubled youth we talk about our concern for the safety of the youth. Usually, when we do, we are talking abut the physical safety of the young people. And if someone working with the youth was to expose the youth to physical danger, we would be quick to respond because of how we have prioritized physical safety as a concern. We need to put psychological safety in the same place on our list or priorities. Change that policy line from ‘the physical safety of young people’ to ‘the physical and psychological safety and security of young people’. Once psychological security becomes a high priority, then we will become more focused on it in out work. And this alone will help to create a safer environment, psychologically as well as physically.

7. Be careful of which staff needs are not being met in relationships with youth.
We all have our own needs. We all work to have our needs met. Most of our needs are met in the context of relationships with others. We need to ensure that the people working with youth know that there is the danger that they will use their relationships with young people to satisfy their own needs. We need to help staff be self-aware enough to recognize their own needs and when they are trying to have those needs met. And then we need to help them to understand how this might happen in their relationships with young people and what they should do if they notice this in their work. Part of a supervisor's role is to help people reflect on why they are doing what they are doing, and that includes paying attention to need-meeting behaviors. I know that we are all meeting our own needs in working with young people and their families: the need to be helpful; the need to feel that our lives are meaningful and; the need to care for others, for example. This is normal and even healthy. It is how these needs are met that is important. And of course, we must be concerned about staff meeting other, less healthy, needs in their relationships with youth. The caring and treatment for troubled youth is about meeting youths' needs, not the needs of staff. This, and this alone, should be our primary goal.