Trauma Recovery Program

Established in response to the terrorist attacks on September 11th, the Trauma Recovery Program initially provided crisis counseling, education and support services to parents, teachers and children in the communities of lower Manhattan most directly impacted by the attacks. Over time, our services have increasingly focused on the mental health care needs of the City’s most vulnerable populations, including homeless children and families, and children served by the New York City Administration for Children’s Services’ (ACS) child protective, preventive and foster care systems.

The NYSPCC provides a specialized therapeutic program for children who have experienced physical or sexual abuse or have witnessed family violence. In order to begin the healing process, a safe, supportive and nurturing place must be available to help children recover from these traumatic experiences. Through individualized, child-friendly and child-focused counseling sessions, the clinician helps children to more effectively understand and manage their emotions. Most children in our program have never received the mental health counseling needed to help them develop coping skills and recover. The NYSPCC clinicians have also found that individual sessions with the child’s caretaker, in addition to family therapy sessions, improves therapeutic outcomes in all cases where family violence, including sexual abuse, physical abuse and domestic violence, has occurred.

In 2007, the Trauma Recovery Program provided counseling to 86 children totaling 665 individual therapy sessions. 238 family therapy sessions took place for children, their caregivers and extended family members. The NYSPCC clinicians also conducted 300 collateral meetings with parents, caregivers, teachers, social workers, guidance counselors and foster care caseworkers.

Child Empowerment Program

Another component of the Trauma Recovery Program is the Child Empowerment Program (CEP), which aids children deemed “at-risk” by the New York City public school system. At the request of teachers, parents and school counselors, the CEP provides in-class workshops and group mental health services to support vulnerable children’s emotional stability and academic achievement. The CEP focuses on children who are susceptible to trauma due to their prior history of abuse or neglect, experiences in the foster care system or loss of family members or friends through homicide, HIV or substance abuse.

Group topics can include: understanding normal reactions to trauma; dealing with grief and loss; conflict resolution; stress management techniques; promoting healthy relationships; self-esteem; bullying prevention; teen dating violence awareness and prevention and anger management.

In 2007, the Child Empowerment Program provided 11 groups totaling 60 sessions. The CEP served 169 children in five New York City public schools and one community-based after school program.

Sexual Abuse Prevention Workshop

In February 2007, The NYSPCC launched a new component of our Child Empowerment Program, a sexual abuse prevention workshop titled Safe Touches: Personal Safety Training for Children. Safe Touches focuses on sexual abuse prevention for children in kindergarten through third grade.

Using colorful puppets, The NYSPCC’s specially trained clinicians use role-play scenarios to help children recognize safe and unsafe touches, teach body safety and help children identify whom to tell if they have experienced an unsafe touch. They play an interactive role during the workshop by giving suggestions to the puppets on what they can do to keep their bodies safe, and who they can go to for help if they have been in an unsafe situation. Children are also encouraged to ask questions and voice concerns. The workshop emphasizes that if a child has been touched inappropriately, it is never the child’s fault. Each child is given a copy of You’re in Charge! or Keeping my Body Safe!, an activity and coloring book to be used with their parents and designed to reinforce the messages from the workshop. These workbooks are available in both English and Spanish.

The NYSPCC’s Safe Touches workshop has received overwhelmingly positive feedback and several elementary schools have asked us to present Safe Touches to their students. Demand for this program is constant as educating children about their bodies and teaching them how to keep safe is of vital importance. Since inception through December 31, 2007, The NYSPCC provided 60 workshops serving 1,756 children.

Crisis Debriefing Services

From 2003 to the present, The NYSPCC clinicians have provided crisis debriefing services to the New York City Administration for Children’s Services’ (ACS) staff after traumatic events occur, such as child fatalities, violence in the field against a staff member or after handling horrific cases of child physical and sexual abuse. The NYSPCC also conducts bereavement groups following the death of an ACS staff member. The “Restoring Resiliency Response” protocol, developed by Mary L. Pulido, Ph.D., The NYSPCC's Executive Director, has been utilized in these sessions. Providing a safe space for everyone to voice feelings about loss is important for team-building and setting up needed support systems instrumental in returning staff to previous levels of functioning. As “first responders” to child abuse and neglect cases in New York City, they need support to continue their noble but difficult mission. In 2007, The NYSPCC provided 49 crisis debriefing sessions to 271 ACS staff members.

To request trauma recovery services, or to obtain additional information, please contact:

Catherine Lewis, LCSW
Director of Clinical Services
212-233-5500 x227
clewis@nyspcc.org