At the request of the U.S. Department of Defense’s Office of Military Family Readiness Policy’s Children, Youth, and Families (OMFRP’s) CYP Division, the VLS has published the third and final training in the series of supplemental trainings on child abuse prevention and reporting. Enhancing Protective Factors of Children and Families reviews the five protective factors outlined in the Strengthening Families framework, addresses specific ways to strengthen each factor in families and caregivers, and highlights programmatic practices that promote these protective factors. The training also calls attention to the considerations that should be made to ensure that the cultural influences of every family are respected. This required training can be accessed by CYP personnel and family child care providers at the following link: https://www.virtuallabschool.org/st/abuse-3.
To enhance the content reviewed in this training, a new toolkit activity has been developed and added to the Training & Curriculum Specialist (TCS) Foundational Track. In Lesson Five of the TCS, Family Engagement course, a new Apply activity titled Strengthening Protecting Factors: Engaging Questions has been included. This activity can be used to foster reflective thinking and dialogue with staff members or providers about the conversations they have with families that promote protective factors.
Please note that these trainings will not be listed in the VLS website PD catalogs or dashboards and currently can only be accessed via these news releases. The VLS will not be issuing assessments, certificates, or tracking progress. Please consult leadership at your program or Service if you have additional tracking or administrative questions. For more information on each of these supplemental trainings, please review the memorandum provided by the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Military Community and Family Policy.
