Spring Conference Wrap-Up and Farewell

By David S. Prescott, LICSW

As someone who has borne witness to change in clients for over 40 years, I recently found myself at a true crossroads a few weeks ago and stepped down from the ATSA Blog. This kind of change is always bittersweet. I have been very fortunate to be part of the blog since its earliest days, when Robin Wilson first established it at ATSA’s behest. The timing has been good; I am just back from many of the spring conferences in our field. Each of these conferences has been an opportunity to reflect on a long career in the field and to look forward as well.

In April, the Oregon and Washington state chapters of ATSA teamed up for a conference at the beautiful Skamania Resort on the banks of the Columbia River. The Pacific Northwest is one of the birthplaces of ATSA, and its strong independent spirit was evident at this conference. A highlight of the experience was Lyne Piché and Anton Schweighofer coming down from Canada to discuss their work with people convicted of CSAM crimes. However, the real take-away was the fact that this inaugural joint conference showed what can happen when organizations team up to talk about their work and the challenges they face. This grassroots effort not only recalled ATSA’s earliest days (often involving brown-bag lunches to discuss the use and misuse of the existing measures of the time), but also exemplified how a small group of dedicated professionals can make things happen.

The Minnesota ATSA conference convened in April. MnATSA now has a long history of highly organized events, strongly influenced by long-time members who know the audience and bring humor and camaraderie as well as numerous options for workshops. The highlights included a keynote address by Apryl Alexander, who reminded us of the importance of simply talking about the issues we face – particularly in respecting individual cultural differences. Another highlight was Jill Levenson’s keynote address on post-conviction stress and its effects on clients. Each of these keynotes would have been unimaginable 20 years ago and were only possible because of our field’s history of not shying away from difficult conversations.

A week or two later, the Oregon Adolescent Sexual Offending Treatment Network held it’s 40th anniversary conference. To celebrate, the organizers brought in Tim Kahn to provide a pre-conference workshop and then had an afternoon panel featuring Tim Kahn, Tom Leversee, and me to reflect back and look ahead. Without any question, the biggest take-away from this conference was the discussion of the use of polygraph with adolescents, especially in the wake of ATSA’s 2017 statement that it no longer supported the use of this measure. Given the role of polygraph in our field’s history, the discussion illustrated the sea change of thought and improved practice as the use of the polygraph has waned. Sadly, it was almost entirely extemporized in the moment by the speakers, highlighting a fact of great conferences: You had to be there; it wasn’t recorded or written down.

Finally, towards the end of May, the combined conference of New York State ATSA and the Alliance for the Prevention of Sexual Abuse convened. After excellent pre-conference workshops and a shared keynote by Jacque Page and Bob McGrath, Jeffrey Sandler presented preliminary outcome data from New York’s Strict and Intensive Supervision and Treatment program. One view of his findings was that this program not only has considerable impact, but that when clients do return to the system, it is more likely to be as a result of factors related to antisociality rather than problematic sexual interests. Another highlight was when New York resident Justyna Rzewinski received the conference’s President’s Award for her remarkable efforts at exposing cruel practices at New York City’s Rikers Island. Together, Sandler’s exhaustive research and Rzewinski’s courage are models for what can be accomplished in our field.

That’s it for me! I am eternally grateful to Robin Wilson for asking me to join the blog early on, and to all of those I worked with subsequently, including Jon Brandt, Alissa Ackerman, Kieran McCartan, and Kasia Uzieblo. Of course, I am most grateful to my wife, Louise, who has been patient with my fascination with this work for 32 years, and who has always been willing to speak with me as an outsider, sharing ideas and feedback. As the old saying goes, alone I can travel faster, but together we can go further.

Not the end, rather the next chapter

By Kieran McCartan & Kasia Uzieblo

Sexual abuse is a complicated and simple issue simultaneously. This is a source of concern, frustration, hope, and despair for many individuals working in the field. It is a multi-agency, multidisciplinary issue involving numerous organisations, charities, frontline services, and providers working with individuals to address the reality, causes, and impact of it. Over the years, we have come to see sexual abuse as a multi-systemic issue that impacts all levels of society (individual, interpersonal, community, societal), all facets of society (gender, race, culture, health, psychology and wellbeing), and all societies; it is truly a global issue. Part of the challenge of sexual abuse is the conversation, communication and messaging around it. Translating professional, policy and research conversations to public and community discourses to educate and upskill everyone. This was the aim of the blog when it was first established as an offshoot of the Journal of Sexual Abuse and continues to be its aim as it transitions to being the ATSA blog, aligning with its policy and practice addenda moving forward. Sexual abuse, and the blog, has always been evidence- and practice-based and politically motivated (with a small “p”), and this remains true today, but has become more critical with the current socio-political climate.

Over the years, since the first blog in July 2010 by Robin Wilson (the original lead blogger on the site), there have been 574 blogs (this is the 575th), and they have covered everything from treatment, polygraph, policing, policy approaches, trauma-informed practice, work with adults as well as children and young people, drug and psychological therapies, risk assessment, victim services and narratives, policy, practice, research, conference reviews, and obituaries for leaders in the field.  The blog has featured numerous associate bloggers and guest blog posts over the years, truly reflecting the discussions among professionals, practitioners, policymakers, and what you might expect to see at an ATSA, NOTA, ANZATSA, NL-ATSA, or IATSO conference. In doing so, the blog has succeeded in gathering a wide range of international voices and insights, albeit predominantly from the Western world, thus fostering an important global dialogue while acknowledging the need to continue expanding diverse perspectives. The blog, although aimed at professionals, talked to members of the public and highlighted critical public debates and issues. However, it is also a real challenge, as the field of sexual abuse has become more political over the last 15 years, nationally and internationally, which means that there needs to be a more strategic and coordinated approach to the blog and what it is saying.

As of next week, the blog will be run by the ATSA staff, marking an essential milestone in the evolution of the blog and ATSA’s transition from a grassroots members' organisation to a professional policy and practice organisation. The blog has been and will continue to be a central tenet of ATSA’s messaging, and it will remain so.

As we look ahead, the future of the blog lies not only in continuing to reflect the breadth and depth of professional discourse, but also in strengthening its role as a platform for engagement, advocacy, and change. Over the past 15 years, the blog has already played a vital role in informing, challenging, and connecting thousands of readers—something reflected in both its sustained readership and its consistent ranking among the top sexual abuse blogs globally. As it becomes more deeply embedded within ATSA, we believe this integration will open up new opportunities to amplify ATSA’s mission, inform policy and practice, and foster meaningful dialogue across disciplines. In times marked by increasing societal polarisation, growing misinformation, and a widespread questioning of scientific evidence and expertise, it is more important than ever that we stand strong together - grounded in evidence, united in purpose, and committed to supporting all those affected by sexual abuse.

As we pass the torch, we want to express our heartfelt gratitude to everyone who has contributed to, responded to, challenged, and supported the blog over the years. It has been a privilege to be part of this vibrant and committed community. We are proud of the conversations we’ve fostered, the bridges we’ve built, and the critical issues we’ve been able to highlight together. The field of sexual abuse prevention and response has undoubtedly evolved: there is more open discussion, policies have shifted (albeit still too few and too slow), and research continues to grow. But we are far from talking. Despite decades of effort, innovation, and intervention, prevalence rates of sexual violence remain stubbornly stable. This stark reality reminds us that the fight against sexual abuse is far from over. It calls on us to reflect critically on what works, what doesn’t, and what needs to change. We must keep pushing forward, with renewed commitment to prevention at every level: individual, relational, institutional, and societal. That’s why platforms like this blog are not only relevant but essential. We cannot - and must not - stop talking about sexual abuse, our response to it or how we individually, as well as collectively, can prevent it.

When things come up.

By Stephanie Wayda, BA.

You’ll always hear something you aren’t expecting. Through my journalistic work and recent research work, I’ve come to realize that stories of sexual abuse can surface in interviews even if the interview doesn’t directly ask about abuse.

My undergraduate degree is in Journalism from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I wanted to go into journalism to learn how to develop the skills to help people tell their stories better. My true passion lies in storytelling. Journalism felt like a great path to learning, research and storytelling.

I’ve focused on helping others tell their story and relay important issues. In Champaign, Illinois I helped tell stories of arrests for marijuana before and after legalization showing how Black people were arrested more, a minority community surrounded by liquor and gambling establishments, and then as part of my undergraduate studies I was the Director of Photography on a documentary following women across Sierra Leone, Africa, advocating and finding solutions to period poverty for girls and young women.

Since graduating from university, I’ve been working on research related to my documentary work. Dr. Sophie King-Hill, Idrissa Kamara (Fourah Bay College, Freetown, Sierra Leone), and I are conducting qualitative research about why professionals in Sierra Leone choose careers in sexual health. We’re looking to understand the motivations of these professionals working with what is a stigmatizing issue in the context of Sierra Leone due to religion and traditional values.

Sierra Leone is a coastal West African country with a population of almost nine million people. Sierra Leone’s history includes the Transatlantic Slave Trade, Civil War, Ebola, a deadly mountain slide, and now the removal of USAID. Gender based violence in Sierra Leone is a common occurrence. According to UNFPA, sixty-two percent of women report experiencing physical or sexual violence. To combat this, the government of Sierra Leone has passed legislation such as the Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Act 2022. Most recently, they passed the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act 2024.

Our research, conducted in spring 2025, used narrative interviews. In the interviews, we asked participants about their backgrounds, life histories, life course development, career pathways, and current attitudes, beliefs, and context. This was to help us get a better understanding of the context of their lives and the motivations leading them to their choice to have a career in sexual health. None of the questions asked about previous experience with sexual abuse or any specific sexual health topic. Yet, in several interviews, I heard stories of sexual abuse. I wasn’t expecting to hear those stories in this research, but I did. I expected to hear stories about the context of growing up in Sierra Leone, and the challenges it presented, or stories of personal struggles, monetary or otherwise, or other positive stories about wanting to help others.

In Sierra Leone, I talked to educators who support students’ needs outside of the core curriculum, who support student health and wellbeing as well as educational achievement lesson plans, and who offer discussion or hygiene items to students in need. I talked to students at the university looking to pursue a career in sexual health. I talked to women who support other women, children of all genders, and their community. Throughout these interviews, I heard stories about different kinds of sexual abuse which were committed by different individuals. The way in which the participants opened varied from casual, short, long, or intense, depending on the person. This really spoke to the varying impact that sexual abuse has on people and that not all victims understand and process it, or recover from it, in the same way. I encountered many different stories from an array of different people and learned to navigate each one differently. From the people I talked with, I found that the abuse committed against the (survivors/victims) was by a person in the close family unit, i.e., romantic partner, mother, father, or sibling. From what people said, the family units stayed intact, and the abuse wasn't something openly discussed.

The people I’ve gotten to know in Sierra Leone are extremely compassionate and kind, but hearing of the additional adverse experiences they encountered and how that positively motivated them to help others really impacted me.

As a journalist, I’m accustomed to hearing about difficult topics and sensitive issues in interviews and having to compassionately navigate them. In the research setting, it became even more apparent that people felt comfortable opening about their experiences of abuse, again, even if abuse wasn’t asked about. I felt emotional and honored that people feel comfortable opening up to me about their experiences of sexual abuse. Before this research project and talking with professionals in the sexual abuse field, I had to develop strategies based on little previous knowledge to navigate talking with someone about their abuse. Journalism classes don’t necessarily teach you how to navigate those conversations. Much of your response relies on your compassion and understanding, which can still be effective.

Sexual abuse isn’t a topic that I feel at ease talking about or hearing about. It makes me feel deeply emotional, but I’m able to disconnect that part of myself when someone opens up. I think that everyone deserves respect and to be properly listened to and understood. After talking with someone, I can emotionally process or take measures to take care of myself, but in the moment, that person deserves and receives every bit of my attention.

Research interviews are different from journalistic interviews due to less strict guidelines and fewer oversights. Confidentiality isn’t guaranteed, and anonymity is taken very seriously if needed in journalism. Whereas research interviews value anonymity, and any recognition is taken seriously. Talking to people isn’t any different, but the adjustment to asking questions in a set way was something I easily adjusted to. I felt a lot of pressure internally to conduct these interviews to the highest standard, with minimal experience with academic-style interviewing. I anticipated less personability from myself and the participants but found that people felt comfortable and safe talking with me about their story. I found I felt far more comfortable than I anticipated. As a non-clinically trained person, I consulted with my advisor, Dr. Sophie King-Hill, to reflect on how I handled situations, and I felt like I handled them in the best way I could, not expecting the topic of abuse to come up as often as it did.

In the past few months of working with sexual abuse professionals, Dr. Sophie King-Hill, Prof. Kieran McCartan, and David Russell, I’ve learned a lot about sexual abuse and strategies to support individuals opening about abuse. Learning from these professionals made me realize how, outside of a professional environment, society isn’t equipped with proper tools or information to navigate anything surrounding sexual abuse. Their guidance and support helped prepare me for those interviews and speaking with people about their abuse.

In the U.S., I think about all of the barriers and struggles victims and their families face, such as stigma, shame, and resources. In Sierra Leone, I found that people faced the same barriers. With the interviews in Sierra Leone, I heard stories of sexual abuse, and I learned about myself in the process. I learned that I could listen to stories of sexual abuse and support individuals in the moment of opening up. I can offer agency in their opening up so they can decide what they’d like to share.

From all my experience in Sierra Leone and my reflection, I’ve truthfully found an increased sense of personal responsibility to support people in the moment of them opening up. One person I talked with wasn’t sure about opening up, and before they said anything about the issue they were going to bring up, I made sure to tell them they don’t have to share anything they don’t want to. Once they opened up, I wanted them to feel a sense of empowerment in sharing their story, so to one person I said, “You have the power now to share or not share. It’s up to you, you have all the power at this moment.”  

I’m not sure where my work will take me, but in my career, I will take my experience in talking about sexual abuse and expand my ability to talk about other difficult topics with a focus on the participant telling their story in a comfortable way. I’ve also developed strategies to listen to difficult topics. This experience deepened my cultural competence and ability to discuss difficult topics cross-culturally. Since people have been so vulnerable with me, it’s encouraged me to be more vulnerable.

The changing landscape of professional development: Online training a consideration or cautionary tale?

By Kieran McCartan, Ph.D., & Anne Eason, DCrimJ

Training frontline staff in the social and criminal justice sector is essential. It is important to have a reflective, compassionate and trauma informed workforce that can engage with sensitive and challenging topics in a way that supports vulnerable service users and allows for positive reflection as well as peer support. However, this can be challenging given the nature of multi-disciplinary work of frontline services which are often oversubscribed, under resourced and understaffed. So, how do we build a more equipped and informed workforce? Should it be through internal training or ongoing staff development or external, specialist CPD? What is the best and most effective way to engage staff and to improve their knowledge and skill base?

Traditionally, all frontline social and criminal justice staff (including but not limited to police, probation, prison, and social work staff) were trained in person. The training, whether initial foundation, degree or recruit training, was done in person in the classroom using. In more recent years, simulation and practical teaching is linked to real world examples to embed learning prior to practice placements. The role of academic and practice learning was, and still is, essential to these services, as it emphasises the importance of understanding the research and practice evidence base, as well as being able to implement it in real world, often high-pressure situations. The role of the classroom is as a safe environment for professionals to discuss, and get wrong, challenging and complex issues. A place within which they can develop reflection, compassion, and professional support structures. In person training and development adds to professional culture and enables professionals to ‘road test’ ideas and concepts before going into the field. This is particularly important with sensitive and challenging issues like child sexual abuse, neglect, sexual abuse, domestic violence, suicide, and severe mental health. The in-person training and development allows a shared understanding and an opportunity to professionally bond around these issues.

One of the notable challenges in teaching sensitive topics is that staff have different life experiences, where some may have direct or indirect lived experiences of these issues, while others will never have encountered them before and therefore, they may be quite abstract to them. Given our experiences as researchers, ex-professionals and current programme leads in the in frontline services we see this as important as staff need to understand and seek support throughout their career, including their training, and if they cannot openly discuss course content how will they be able to discuss professional practice?

The challenge that frontline services now face is that the training and staff development portfolio and delivery method are now changing from in person to online only or hybrid. This change is driven by many factors, including, the costs of running in person training; the travel time and environmental cost; the cost of repeating in person training and having a balanced, replicable training programme. The need for speedy recruitment and placement of staff (which is evident in policing and probation) as well as their geographical location are also deciding factors all of which makes online training more appealing. The online training world has developed quickly over the past 10 – 15 years, aided by Covid-19, and has opened some really positive experiences such as being able to engage with international, specialist speakers and content, having a presentation that is standardised and permanent. The online training world, and the opportunities that it offers, are limitless. However, the one challenge that it faces, and has not yet overcome, is participant engagement or issues of impact. You do not get the same discussion, reflection, or questions and answers in online training and development that you do in in person ones. Typically, trainees attend, listen but don’t often engage, which is challenging if you are discussing sensitive and challenging material. As a trainer or educator, you do not want attendees sitting alone processing challenging content and feeling unable to reach out or seek support. This is a bad starting point in any profession. It reinforces current and historical trauma and inevitably leads to practice issues and burn out. Furthermore, these topics frequently involve in-person disclosures unlikely in online forums. It is important, therefore, that we consider how online learning is used and what areas of practice can be taught safely, without impacting the learner’s wellbeing.

Online training is a great resource, but it is important to contextualise it within a wider training, mentoring, and practice portfolio for frontline staff. In addition, the content of online training needs to be considered, are all topics able to be taught online or are there certain topics (like sexual and interpersonal violence) that need to be taught in person initially and then maybe followed up with online training. It is important that sensitive issues that are at the core of service users, and some professional, lives are not taught in a removed, abstract or impersonal way. With the constitutional move to online training, it is essential that these issues are properly considered and a trauma informed approach is taken which is likely to involve at least an element of face-to-face delivery.