Our Approach to Prevention
CAPS works to prevent child sexual abuse before harm occurs. We build protective knowledge, skills and confidence around children, connecting their learning with the adults, organisations and communities responsible for their safety.
Acting Before Harm Occurs
Primary prevention means taking action before abuse happens, without waiting for a concern, disclosure or identified risk.
Our approach helps children develop age-appropriate understanding of body ownership, boundaries and seeking help, while equipping adults to create safer environments and take protective action.
This work complements safeguards such as clear rules for adults working with children and checks on who can work with them. Adults also learn to recognise concerns and respond appropriately when a child needs help.
Working with Children and Adults Together
Children’s learning is reinforced when the adults around them understand it, use consistent language and respond supportively.
A conversation about boundaries in an early learning setting can continue at home. A child expressing discomfort needs a trusted adult, including a parent or carer, who listens and knows how to act. An educator recognising a concern needs the skills and support to respond appropriately.
Our approach connects these relationships, helping parents, carers and educators reinforce children’s learning and put prevention into everyday practice.
Responsibility for safety remains firmly with adults. No child should be expected to recognise or stop abuse to keep themselves safe.
Beginning in Early Childhood
Early childhood offers an opportunity to establish protective language and understanding as children develop and learn about relationships.
Early learning services bring children and their families together with educators, creating opportunities to reinforce prevention through play, conversations and daily routines.
Our flagship program, Safe Communities, Safe Children (SCSC), brings these groups together through connected education, activities and resources, with support to continue prevention beyond the program sessions.
Strengthening Practice Through Evidence
CAPS draws on more than 50 years of specialist prevention experience, research and feedback from children, families and educators.
Our partnership with the Australian Institute of Health Innovation at Macquarie University brings independent evaluation alongside SCSC delivery, helping us improve the program and contribute to wider prevention practice.
Our ambition is for every child to have access to safe, evidence-informed and age-appropriate child sexual abuse prevention.