April, 2003
Status Report on CAPE-D/HH
By Madan M. Vasishta
We received the news early in March that the Center for Abuse Prevention and Education will not be funded again. The present economic situation, shifting of priorities in the aftermath of 9/11, the looming war, and the political situation all combined resulted in funding cuts in many programs and CAPE was one of them.What now?
As most of you know, CAPE funding was not renewed last year. However, we at CAPE were committed to providing services as long as we could with the available funding. We made some very creative budget revisions and managed to keep CAPE alive for two years on one year's funding! It was hard, but thanks to the present CAPE staff we managed to knit a silk purse from a sow's ears. As the result of it we were not only able to meet our original goals, but also add new ones.
We have been providing training to schools and other programs as usual. However, this training was limited to 11 southeastern states as mandated in the original goals. We received a lot of requests from other states but had to reject those due to funding restrictions. However, we are open to providing workshop all over the nation free of charge if the requesting agency foots the travel expenses of our trainers.
We added another goal last year. Our needs assessment survey results indicated that people were very interested in receiving curriculum and instructional material in the area of sexual abuse prevention education. Accordingly, we have been developing goals and instructional modules that teachers, parents, and houseparents can use for teaching children who are deaf or hard of hearing. Our progress in this goal has been sporadic and slow. Mainly, because none of us an expert on curriculum and instructional material development. We had been butting our heads in the darkness of our own lack of expertise and are, finally, going to get consultative support from someone who knows.
Our plan is to develop several modules for different levels (preschool through high school), have them field tested, revised and presented to schools and programs serving children who are deaf and hard of hearing. Most of these modules will be available on our website or on CDs. Thus, you can download the modules needed for your program.
How will we do it?
We were asked how could we increase our activities with reduced budget. It is simple. We made reduction in staff, cut down all frills and followed a shoestring approach to all activities. This helped and we are proud of our achievements and feel good about the legacy that CAPE will leave on September 30, 2003 when it closes its doors officially.
CAPE may close, but the work will not stop. The material developed between now and September 30 will fill the chasm that has been gaping at us for a long time. Our staff has shrunk to four people-Shannon Reese, Susan Roberts, Debbie Beeson, and myself. We are working diligently and hope to finish the goals for which CAPE was established plus more-the goals we added.
Thank you very much for your support. Your input has been of great help in improving our services.
Looking forward to hearing more from you.