Adolescent and Child Abuse in Film, Fiction, and Reality
This course; wow. When I signed up for this intimidating and dark seminar, I never could have imagined how much light it would bring into my life and how it would help me develop a passion for helping victims of adolescent and child abuse. As an education major, I am always interested in student-centered issues, especially issues with students that are most likely falling through the cracks in the education system. This past semester, I actually worked with some students who were victims of child abuse while taking this course, which was especially hard for me. What we were learning in class was not just literature, or a far off issue I never had to see. The material that we covered in class touched my heart and made me a more empathetic individual. One of the most significant experiences I had in this course was when we read Invisible Kids by Holly Schlaack and meeting Holly in class. I see some many admirable qualities in Holly that I hope reflect in my being as an educator and activist. Holly has been dedicated to helping children in the foster care system for years and has created her own non profit organization, Invisible Kids. Since meeting Holly in the course, we have kept in touch and I plan on supporting her in her new initiative: Stand Up and Fix This! Billie was a wonderful professor and I so enjoyed every meeting we had with our class. Our main focus in the course was to read novels, articles, legal documents, and absorb film that all related to adolescent and child abuse. After viewing these mediums, we discussed the victims, perpetrators, and short/long term effect of child abuse on a person. We viewed testimonies and legal cases of the accused and the witnesses. Throughout all of this discussion, we built a powerful dialogue about what the public can do to be aware of and stop adolescent and child abuse. For the Undergraduate Research Conference, our class presented a poster about what the course was about, our service learning at Buckhorn, and how viewers could help raise awareness. In addition to the product we created for the URC, we also wrote reflection responses every week about material we were absorbing or specific issues revolving around adolescent and child abuse. See one of my responses in the button below! The most meaningful part of the experience was our service learning trip to Buckhorn Child and Family Services. This two day trip involved our entire class going to the facility to paint the rooms of the participants. Our entire class painted 8 girls' bedrooms in our time there and even had the pleasure of being entertained by the residents' talent show. After the talent show, we spoke to the residents a little and thanked them for allowing us to visit their facility and provide service. In return, the residents had lots of questions for us about college life, Cincinnati, and our majors and future career goals. It was an experience that I will never forget and I am truly honored to have met the individuals at Buckhorn Child and Family Services.