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University Daily Kansan, November 29, 1982
Awareness helps abused children
Bv DONNA KELLER
By DONNA KELLER Staff Reporter
The memories most people have of their childhoods are happy memories, often in contrast to the realities of adolescence.
The memories of some people are a blur of fear, pain, tears and feelings of rejection. In the lives of many children today, those memories are being created in a familial cycle of child abuse.
The number of reported and confirmed cases of child abuse increases yearly; each figure nearly doubles that of the previous year.
Community awareness of abuse in recent years has caused agents of child welfare — the schools, the state agencies and the courts — to consider the needs of the family, as well as the needs of the child.
THEATING THE symptoms of abuse is part of a community effort to prevent abuse.
Donna Swail, a social worker for the Lawrence school district, said that teachers were in the best position to detect signs of child abuse because of the large amount of time they spent with children.
The Kansas Child Protection Act, passed in 1972, mandates that professionals in daily contact with a child report any suspected abuse.
Swall said that since the law went into effect, there had been an increased awareness of the signs of abuse and of neglect by teachers and other school professionals.
"WHAT REALLY makes the teacher willing to report suspected abuse is knowing the child may be hurt more seriously if it is not reported," she said. "The law enables the teachers to be the advocates for the child's well-being."
The state Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services received 2,394 abuse reports during the first half of 1982. Of those, SRS confirmed 865 cases of physical abuse of children under the age of 18.
Those figures are more than four times the totals in 1977.
Douglas County ranked eighth among Kansas counties. There were 99 cases of abuse confirmed of the 346 reports received.
Approximately 58 percent of suspected abusers are the mothers of the children, double the percentage for fathers.
Almost 27 percent of the reports were anonymous calls, 14 percent from schools, and 10 percent from neighbors.
GARY HAWORTH, director of elementary education for the school district, said the increase in the number of cases reported and confirmed could be related to a greater public awareness of the problem, but that stress on parents caused by economic conditions also could be a factor.
Swall said one of the most useful tools in educating local school professionals about child abuse was a filmstrip that could be used to show the signs that signal possible child abuse.
Physical indicators include numerous or identical bruises on the child's body, burns, bite marks or swollen joints. Extreme passive or aggressive behavior or abrupt changes in behavior require the teacher reason to suspect abuse.
Donna Flory, social services supervisor at the Douglas County SRS office, said abuse could encompass the physical, sexual or emotional mistreatment of a child and included the way a child was spoken to or disciplined.
SHE SAID a fine distinction was made between child abuse and child
"Some people distinguish the two by saying neglect is an act of omission, and abuse is an act of commission," she said.
WHAT WERE acceptable methods of discipline earlier in this century no longer are acceptable, she said. Attention has turned towards efforts to prevent abuse by teaching parents positive methods of discipline.
"What are you teaching the children when you hit them? If you're bigger and you hit harder, you win." Flory said. "It's been said that the first hit is for the rest are for the parent. I strongly believe the difference is in self-control."
Protective-services workers represent the state in looking after a child's welfare. Workers investigate each abuse report to determine whether a child has been abused, and if so, what action they can take in the child's best interest.
Floy said one of the most frustrating things about protective services was suspecting that a child was being abducted. He evidence to remove him from the home.
"You hope you don't end up getting proof by having a damaged child," she added. "And you're not supposed to."
very personal thing. But maybe you have stopped a cycle that would have gone on with the family."
MANY TIMES it is up to the courts to decide whether a home is safe for a
Mike Elwell, associate judge in the specialized division of district court, said that two types of cases came before the court: those to sever a child from the family and those to seek the help to keep the family together.
Elwell said the philomophy of the courts concentrated on attempting to find a suitable solution.
He said that when working with families the court used a plan that could include removing a child from the home for long periods of time (for filling in parents, the child or both.
"The approach is in the spirit of cooperation, and the goal is to reunite the family," he said.
ELWELL SAID that although child welfare codes had been made more specific, they did not help with the situation and was when to intercome on a child's behalf.
Most of the children involved in the court's actions have been reunited with their families, he said.
"You're giving the parents a chance to fail or succeed. As long as the successes outweigh the failures, the approach is favorable," he said.
Nationwide, communities have recognized the need for education and support services for parents, looking for a cure through prevention.
Parents Anonymous of Lawrence is part of a national peer-support network, founded by a former abusive mother, which recognizes the frustrations of child-rearing and offers parents positive alternatives to dealing with those frustrations without losing control.
JEWELL NORRIS, Lawrence sponsor and facilitator of Parents Anonymous, said she organized the local chapter two years ago after realizing the community need for the support group.
"Many parents have never been instructed on child-rearing," she said. "We're all just human. It doesn't come easily." She said many extra support from outside resources."
She said that because the group was not a government agency, it was seen as less of a threat to those who participated.
Norris said that prevention of child abuse was as important as treating it.
fortable, where society has made them feel uncomfortable." she said.
"WE HAVE to the breaking point," she said. "A mother who comes home and screams at her children can be that one who is one who physically abuses her child."
"Its anonymity makes them com-
Sue DeVoe, Lawrence senior and mother of a 7-year-old boy, participates in the Lawrence chapter of Parents Anonymous.
She is from a middle-class background. The stories that portray abusive parents are ignorant, lower-status minorities as exceptions, she said
No one wants to talk about child abuse, DeVeo says, but she speaks so that other abusive parents will know they are not alone and will seek help, she said.
"I repeated my mother's mistakes. I was screaming, my expectations were unrealistic, and I knew I was out of control." DeVoe said. "I was mad at her for being so angry and I wondered why people were telling me stay like that."
DEVEO SAID she called the national child abuse hotline after watching a television show sponsored by Parents Anonymous.
"The man on the program talked about his feelings before he had killed his child. I realized those were my feelings, too." she said.
She was referred to the Kansas City chapter of Parents Anonymous, and died in 2016.
The group, which acts as both a support and therapy group, is much smaller than the group of people.
"They supported me until I could stand on my own and take control of my life."
SHE SAID she, like most parents, had unreal expectations about child-rearing because she was taught to behave and not to nurture the child.
Abuse is cyclical, passing from generation to generation, she said. More women than men abuse their children because the women were more violent when they married men who were verbally or physically abusive to them.
"I had no idea of what a decent relationship was. I know now it's respect and consideration for the other persons involved." Devoe said. "My mother doesn't always do as I wish, but because I've given help, he won't have to."
Anti-protectionist trade plan reached in world conference
By United Press International
GENEVA, Switzerland-World trading nations, many of them voicing reservations, adopted a weak declaration early today on fighting protectionism and re-engaging a basic commitment to free trade.
A 17-page document was adopted at 3:50 a.m. (8:50 p.m. CST) by the 88 member states of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
The compromise package called on GATT nations merely to "reduce trade frictions and overcome prostrate measures" as best they could
The European Economic Community said it had reservations, especially on sections dealing with
agricultural trade, while Third World countries had reservations on the issue of freer trade in service industries, banking, insurance and shipping.
COUNTRIES EXPRESSING reservations refused to be bound by language in the document, which was drawn up in six days and nights of often bitter bargaining — two of them had been scheduled.
"I don't think Congress will be happy with some of the elements of the document," U.S. trade representer William E. Brock told reporters.
Congress is pressuring the Reagan administration for protectionist measures against countries in poor nations, good, especially farm products.
Rebels say they possess plans of U.S. action in El Salvador
By United Press International
SAN SALVADOR, EI Salvador—Rebels said yesterday they captured U.S. military documents saying that Green Berets should be used to lead combat operations in El Salvador.
The rebels' Radio Venceremos reported that the documents captured from the U.S. Southern Command in Panama recommended using the Green Berets because the Salvadoran military "has been exhausted."
It said one document was from Gen. Wallace Nutting, who allegedly said that U.S. "military advisers must assume command of the operations."
Nutting, commander of all U.S. forces in South and Central America, was not immediately available for comment on the recommendation, which would contradict congressional rules that U.S. advisers stay out of combat zones.
The rebels did not say how they obtained the documents.
And a spokesman for the Roman Catholic church said yesterday that Pope John Paul II would visit El Salvador in the spring.
short trip to El Salvador at the end of February or beginning of March.
Salvadoran priest Gregorio Rosa
Chavez said the pope would make a
IN NEW YORK, former U. S. Ambassador to El Salvador Robert White said in a taped interview that he feared the United States was so deeply involved in the Central American nation's internal affairs that it could never get out.
White, ambassador under Jimmy Carter, said he felt that "in their innocence, or ignorance," strategists in the Reagan administration thought they could wrap up the El Salvador crisis in a couple of months.
But he said, "Nothing has come out right for them; and rather than beating an honorable retreat, or changing their lives so much decided to take one more step.
"And I'm afraid that we're in so deep now, we'll never get out."
Venceremos said rebels had overran all important villages in northern La Union province, about 120 miles east of San Salvador.
A NATIONAL guard officer disclosed that as many as 5,000 soldiers, including at least one U.S.-trained battalion, might be ready to retake the area.
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