Child Abuse Prevention Month

ways to give

April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month. To help your program make the most of this opportunity, Texas CASA has created a toolkit that contains a variety of resources, templates, media and community outreach tips, and more to further your program’s message.

The Need

Child abuse and neglect have a lasting negative impact on the victims, our society and our economy. For information on what we can all do to help prevent child abuse and neglect, read our CASA Voice Deep Dive.

Check out the 2023 DFPS Data Book to find your county’s statistics. Programs can download complete data sets from fiscal year 2014-2023 on the Texas Open Data Portal.

Raising Awareness All Month Long

4Child Abuse Prevention Month is one of our biggest opportunities to step up and educate our friends, families and neighbors about child abuse and neglect, and how we individually and collectively can help prevent it.

Below are some creative ways CASA programs across the state are taking their Child Abuse Prevention Month fundraising and awareness activities to the next level. To get more details on some of these ideas or hear more ideas from recruiters across the state, listen to this Zoom chat. Plus, below you can find ideas specific to Go Blue Day and Blue Sunday.

  • Virtual ribbon campaign | Plan a virtual ribbon campaign fundraiser by selling virtual ribbons and creating an online ribbon wall. Check out CASA of Galveston County’s virtual ribbon wall.
  • Pinwheel garden | Get your community involved to build a pinwheel garden. Get students to help make the pinwheels and build your garden in the front of a local business for the month of April. Check out this photo and this photo of Voz de Niños teaming up with their local university to build their garden.
  • In-person or virtual 5K run | Participants pay their race fee to enter, and then run on their own during certain dates. They then send their activity log from a fitness tracking device, such as a watch or smartphone, to your CASA program. Check out this article on how to host a virtual race for ideas.
  • In-person or online proclamation reading | Invite your county or city to read a proclamation for CAPM and host the event either in person or virtually for volunteers and other community members to attend. See this example from Texas Governor Greg Abbott.
  • Chef’s night | Host a fundraiser by inviting a local chef to give a cooking lesson. Participants get learn and indulge in their tasty creations.
  • Paint the town blue | If your town has a square of any collection of business, ask them to decorate their storefront windows to show awareness for CAPM. Team up with a local artist or school, or let the children you serve do some of the painting.
  • Light the town blue | Sell or give away blue light bulbs to neighbors or businesses and have them light the town blue in April.
  • Sign display | Place signs or other objects in the courthouse lawn or other businesses to represent the number of kids in care in your community, e.g., t-shirt shaped signs, pinwheels, shoes, etc. Check out this display from CASA of the High Plains.
  • Volunteer recognition | Create a social media campaign showing your volunteers wearing blue and holding signs saying why they became a CASA volunteer. Check out this example from CASA of Hidalgo County.
  • T-shirt contest | Have your staff, volunteers or community submit a t-shirt design and have other volunteers or community members vote on their favorite. Have the t-shirts made and sell them to raise money for your program. Check out these designs from Great Plains CASA, CASA of North Texas and Amarillo Area CASA.
  • Fishing tournament | Make a reel difference. Check out CASA for Kids of South Central Texas’ Casting for CASA fundraising event.
  • Coins for CASA | Involve your local school by having classrooms collect coins. Reward the class that raises the most money with a pizza party.
  • Burger drive-thru | Sell burgers in a drive-thru fashion to your community. Work with local businesses to have ingredients donated.
  • Coffee sleeves | Design coffee sleeves and partner with a local coffee shop. Ask if a portion of sales can be donated to CASA. Check out how a previous coffee sleeve campaign turned into a deeper partnership between one local coffee shop and CASA of the Coastal Bend.
  • Traveling lawn decorations | “Decorate” your community. Check out these humorous examples from Great Plains CASA and CASA of Titus, Camp and Morris Counties.
  • Fast food stickers | Partner with a fast food restaurant in your community to design stickers to seal their bags or tack on receipts.
  • Pancake breakfast | Team up with a local restaurant to host a pancake breakfast.
  • Clay shoot | Host a clay or trap shoot. Include prizes and get sponsors!
  • Blue everything! | Invite local restaurants or businesses to create or sell a special blue item and donate proceeds to your program. Some ideas include donuts, drinks, muffins, jewelry, and t-shirts, but the possibilities are endless!

Supporting Families

DFPS has put out several articles, handouts, tips and activities for parents/caregivers, families and the community focused on building healthy relationships and preventing child abuse. These messages and links can be used as is or they can be customized in any way that works best for your community.

View the DFPS Child Abuse Prevention Month Toolkit.

Media Relations

Child Abuse Prevention Month Press Release
Child Abuse Prevention Month Press Release – Spanish
Child Abuse Prevention Month Op-Ed
Child Abuse Prevention Month Op-Ed – Spanish
Sample Proclamation
Sample Proclamation – Spanish

Go Blue Day

2Friday, April 5, 2024, is Go Blue Day for Texas; and thousands of Texans will wear blue, the official color of prevention, to show their support for ending child abuse. Wear CASA Blue on that day, and encourage your friends, family and colleagues to do the same!

Go Blue Day is a great opportunity to perform outreach in the community to raise awareness of Child Abuse Prevention Month and your program.

Ideas for engaging with the community in a virtual or physically distanced environment on Go Blue Day:

  • Ask businesses to wear blue, send a photo and post it on your social media accounts, tagging the business. Be sure to ask them to like the photo and share it on their accounts. Check out this example from CASA of the High Plains.
  • Light the city blue. Ask businesses to turn their lights blue during the night of Go Blue Day.
  • Drop off brochures or flyers with information about your CASA program including your next info session dates.
  • Team up with a local business to create a Go Blue Day item to sell or give away, e.g., collaborate with a local bakery to create Go Blue Day cookies and have proceeds donated to your program.
  • Advertise apparel if your CASA program sells apparel.
  • Partner with other organizations in your area and collaborate on a Go Blue Day outreach activity.

Blue Sunday

Blue SundayBlue Sunday is an annual event where churches pray for the victims of child abuse and those who care for them. Originally starting with 20 churches, Blue

Sunday has grown into an international effort with more than 2 million participants.

This year’s Blue Sunday is on April 28, 2024. It offers CASA programs a great opportunity to not only spread awareness of Child Abuse Prevention Month but also share with members of the faith community how they can get involved with CASA.

Something to think about: Blue Sunday’s messaging is primarily targeted towards Christian churches. What can CASA do in the effort to be open and inclusive to all churches, synagogues, mosques, temples and other diverse places of worship and communities that practice prayer? What might you offer to people who do not practice prayer, but who, in the spirit of Blue Sunday, would like to be mindful and keep these children in their thoughts?

Once you have identified various churches and places of worship, the next step is reaching out to them about participating in Blue Sunday. Ideally, your connection (a volunteer, board member or staff member) to the congregation would talk to the person with the clergy in charge. For additional resources to help your program connect with faith communities, check out our Clergy, CASA and Community toolkit.

One idea to engage faith members is to hand out prayer cards. Feel free to use or be inspired by the prayer cards created by Texas CASA, originally created for Stand Sunday.

Additional ways CASA programs can engage virtually or physically distanced with local places of worship include:

  • creating a Facebook event for Blue Sunday, inviting all faith communities to participate on their own – Check out this example from CASA of Brazos Valley,
  • addressing the congregation virtually about the role of a CASA volunteer, or
  • dropping off a brochure or bulletin board flyer.

Additional information and resources are available on the Blue Sunday Child Abuse Prevention Initiative website.

Social Media

SOCIAL MEDIA BANK

Find posts related to Child Abuse Prevention Month in our new social media bank. Download the sheet and then filter the month to April.

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SOCIAL MEDIA IMAGES

Facebook Cover Photos

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X (Twitter) Header Images

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Promotional Materials

STICKER & BUTTONS

Use the file below to create stickers and buttons to share our Less Me, More We initiative with your friends, family and community during Child Abuse Prevention Month. When printing stickers be sure to use Avery 2” Round Labels 22877.

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Questions?

If you have any questions or other ideas to share about Child Abuse Prevention Month please contact Campaign Marketing & Media Manager Lindsey Lee at llee@texascasa.org.

 

Related Resources