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A new program to be rolled
out this month allows staff and volunteers throughout the diocese to renew
their Protecting Youth and Those Who Serve Them certification from the
comfort of their own home or office.
Working with Shield the Vulnerable, the Diocese of Toledo now allows those
working with youth to renew their certification online.
Until now, all certification renewals were only offered in face-to-face
meetings.
Frank DiLallo, diocesan case manager, has been working with Shield the
Vulnerable since the summer of 2007 to develop the online course to mirror
the content of the in-person programs presented throughout the diocese.
“It is important to note the
online certification program is not for CYO coaches,” Mr. DiLallo adds. The
CYO program still requires all coaches to complete annual in-person
certification for their particular sport.
Approximately 2,000 to 2,500 people attend Protecting Youth workshops
annually.
The online recertification course, located at www.shieldthevulnerable.org, is available
in both English and Spanish and takes about one-and-a-half hours to complete.
“This online course is convenient for people,” Mr. DiLallo says. “You can do
it in parts. If you have a baby crying or something else you have to attend
to, you can stop and go back the next day.”
The easy to navigate program guides the user through a series of statements,
questions, scenarios and quizzes. All work is automatically saved as users
complete each section. Once finished with the course, each user can download
and print a certificate of completion.
Thirteen other dioceses are working with Shield the Vulnerable for online
courses, including several from California
and others in Michigan, Vermont
and Hawaii.
Toledo is the only diocese participating from Ohio.
The licensing fee for the online program cost $1,500 and an advance of
$10,000 was paid to the vendor in anticipation of 2,000 people using the
program in the first year, Mr. DiLallo says. The vendor charges the diocese
$5 per person certifying online, which will be billed back to individual
parishes and schools for their volunteers and employees. Mr. DiLallo suggests
parishes and schools pass that cost on to the individual.
The live workshops continue to be offered throughout the diocese to those who
prefer not to recertify online or don’t want to pay the online fee. They can
still renew certification during any of the workshops offered throughout the
year.
According to Mr. DiLallo, the Protecting Youth workshops
have been offered in the Diocese of Toledo since 1995.
In the Diocese of Toledo, people who regularly work with children are to be
educated about child sexual abuse, its effects and their legal duty to report
it to civil authorities. Depending on their level of contact and involvement
with children, volunteers and employees are divided into low, medium and high
responsibility categories.
Those with low responsibility are required to sign a form promising to abide
by certain behavioral expectations when working with children. People
determined to be low responsibility are typically field trip drivers and
chaperones who are highly supervised by others who have met additional
background screening requirements.
Those determined to have medium or high responsibility are required to sign
the same expectations form and complete a Protecting Youth and Those Who
Serve Them workshop presented by the diocese.
In addition, those with high responsibility are to be fingerprinted by the
Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation.
Examples of people with medium responsibility would include playground or
lunch supervisors, or hall monitors with periodic interaction with children
for a short amount of time and are supervised by a high responsibility
person. People with high responsibility would include priests, deacons,
teachers, coaches, scout leaders and the like.
The expectations form is to be reviewed and signed every five years in
conjunction with certification renewal in the Protecting Youth Workshop.
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