Together, we can do more.
This belief is at the core of who we are. Children’s Advocacy Centers (CACs) were born from this vision:
Everyone involved in child maltreatment investigations could do more to help the child if we worked together.
Rather than a child and their family bouncing around a fragmented system, investigators would come together to listen to the child. All of the investigators hear the same story at the same time. It sounds simple, but this commitment to work together revolutionized the way significant abuse allegations are investigated.
For a child who may have been a victim of abuse, however, the story doesn’t end with the investigation. The effects of abuse can linger. For that reason, CACs ensure that a child has access to support and therapy. The goal of all of this is to help the child heal, so they can get back to being a kid.
In 1990 the first CAC in Michigan began working with children using exactly this approach. Since then, communities across the state have developed a Children’s Advocacy Center of their own. Now more than 90% of children in Michigan have access to a CAC if needed.
We weren’t always a network. In 2007 CACs across the state helped to create a statewide non-profit organization through which CACs could more easily work with each other and their partners because together we can do more.
