Since 2015, PCCD's Children's Advocacy Center Advisory Committee (CACAC) has partnered with the Child Maltreatment Solutions Network (CMSN) at the Pennsylvania State University (PSU) to develop and collaborate on two large-scale, research-based prevention programs designed to address child sexual abuse in Pennsylvania. This partnership is a truly unique collaboration in that the CACAC/PCCD utilizes its portion of Endowment Act (EA, or NCAA/Sandusky penalty) funding to support program implementation, while CMSN utilizes EA funding originally retained by PSU to support program research and technical assistance to the projects.
Over the course of both projects, three programs have been utilized that target three distinct populations that have an important role in the prevention of CSA: (1) adults in the community; (2) second-grade children; and (3) parents. While the first pilot (The Safe and Healthy Communities Initiative) included all three programs, the second (Project Safe and Smart) included the school-based program and a modification to the original parent component. The programs are as follows:
Stewards of Children (SOC), developed by Darkness to Light, is a research-based program for adults in the community and is designed to improve knowledge of CSA, decrease myths surrounding CSA, and increase positive behaviors such as reporting possible abuse to Children and Youth Services. More information about Stewards of Children can be found here.
Developed by the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, Safe Touches teaches K-3rd grade students to trust their feelings about inappropriate touches, say no to someone trying to give them a not-safe touch, walk away or remove themselves from the situation, and report inappropriate touching to a trusted adult. Components are taught by an interactive puppet show within the classroom. More information about Safe Touches can be found here.
Parents have a responsibility and are in a unique position to create a safe environment for their children. Though many parent-education programs give parents the skills to do this generally, no parent-education program was designed around the prevention of CSA, and, to this end, none has demonstrated an effect on CSA specifically. Smart Parents – Safe and Healthy Kids, developed by the PSU Research team and lead by Dr. Kate Guastaferro, was designed to be delivered in a single additional session of an existing evidence-based parent education program for parents with children under 13 years old. Information regarding the development of Smart Parents can be found here. Research that demonstrates the effect of the program on parental awareness and use of protective behaviors can be found here. SPSHK is currently being researched as a stand-alone universal prevention program, now called Smart Parents, and is a component in the current prevention initiative, Project Safe and Smart.
Since 2015, PCCD has partnered with the CMSN to develop, implement, and evaluate a comprehensive CSA prevention strategy. In 2018, the Safe and Healthy Communities Initiative (SHCI) started to be implemented with the overarching goal of using evidence-based programming to prevention child sexual abuse. Child Advocacy Center Advisory Committee (CACAC) member Dr. Jennie Noll and Dr. Kate Guastaferro oversaw the implementation at the Child Maltreatment Solutions Network (CMSN).
The objective of SHCI was to identify the most effective comprehensive child sexual abuse prevention strategy by implementing SOC, Safe Touches, and Smart Parents – Safe and Healthy Kids, in a staggered manner, in four participating counties/areas. Awarded applicants included Bucks, Chester, York, and Somerset/Cambria (both combined into one geographical area) counties. Each site engaged in a cooperative agreement with PCCD that required them to accept a prescribed budget and implementation plan. This allowed for consistency to ensure research could be conducted.
Throughout the course of the Safe and Healthy Communities pilot project, PCCD and CMSN observed considerable interest in child sexual abuse (CSA) prevention programming among schools and heard the urgent need for a universal prevention education program designed specifically for parents. Due to this, and the interest in proliferating CSA prevention, a new solicitation was opened in late fall 2021 that combined Safe Touches within second-grade classrooms and an adaptation of the evidence-informed Smart Parents program. Ten sites were awarded funding and nine continued to implement both components of the program. Each site engaged in a cooperative agreement with PCCD that required them to accept a prescribed budget and implementation plan. This allowed for consistency to ensure research could be conducted. This first round of Project Safe and Smart ended on June 30, 2024 with most projects extending until December 31, 2024. A second Project Safe and Smart solicitation (PSS 2.0) was opened in late Fall 2024. Fifteen sites were awarded funding. PSS 2.0 started on January 1, 2025 with a 30-month project period.
Impact
Since 2022:
- 2,014 Safe Touches workshops were provided
- 38,859 2nd graders received “Safe Touches” training
- 304 concerning statements or disclosures were made to Safe Touches Facilitators
- 574 parents participated across 201 Smarter Parents workshops
Project Safe and Smart Informational Webinar (September 2024)
Child Sexual Abuse Publications and Research
The following research articles have been generated by the prevention pilots:
*Abourjaily E., Guastaferro K., McElwee K., Connell C. (2025). Universal parent-focused child sexual abuse prevention: A quasi-experimental protocol. PLOS ONE Protocols 20(1), e0314459. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0314459
Guastaferro, K., Felt, J. M., Font, S. A., Connell, C.M., Miyamoto, S., Zadzora, K.M., & Noll
J.G. (2020). Parent-focused sexual abuse prevention results from a cluster randomized trial. Child Maltreatment, 27(1), 114-125. https://doi.org/10.1177/1077559520963870
Guastaferro, K., Font, S. A., Miyamoto, S., Zadzora, K. M., Walters, K. E., O'Hara, K. L., Kemner, A. L., & Noll, J. G. (2021). Provider Attitudes and Self-Efficacy When Delivering a Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Module: An Exploratory Study. Health Education & Behavior, 50(2), 172–180. https://doi.org/10.1177/1090198121997731
Guastaferro, K., Holloway, J. L., Trudeau, J., Lipson, L. B., Sunshine, S., Noll, J. G., & Pulido, M. L. (2022).
Virtual delivery of a school-based child sexual abuse prevention program: A pilot study. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, 31(5), 577–592. https://doi.org/10.1080/10538712.2022.2112347
Guastaferro, K., Shipe, S. L., Connell, C. M., Letourneau, E. J., & Noll, J. G. (2023). Implementation of a universal school-based child sexual abuse prevention program: A longitudinal cohort study. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 088626052311587. https://doi.org/10.1177/08862605231158765
Guastaferro, K., Zadzora, K.M., Reader, J.M., Shanley, J., & Noll, J.G. (2019). A parent-focused child sexual abuse prevention program: Development, acceptability, and feasibility. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 28(7), 1862-1877. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-019-01410-y
Guastaferro, K., *Shipe, S.L., Connell., C.M., Zadzora, K.M., & Noll, J.G. (2025). Applying an implementation framework to the dissemination of a school-based child sexual abuse prevention program. Health Promotion & Practice, 26(2), 352 - 361. DOI: 10.1177/15248399231201537 (published online 2023)
Guastaferro, K., *Abuchaibe, V., McCormick, K., *Bhoja, A., *Abourjaily, E., *Melchior, M., *Grayson, C., *Welikson, P., *Dan, C., & *Zeleke, M.B. (2024). Adapting a selective parent-focused child sexual abuse prevention curriculum for a universal audience: A pilot study. PLOS ONE, 1-16. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0302982
Guastaferro, K., *Melchior, M., *Murphy-Costanzo, A.S., *Anderson, A., *Melamed, N., & Madden, S. (2023). Preventive education program outreach on social media: A case study on community-based child sexual abuse prevention efforts. Journal Child Sexual Abuse, 32(8), 963-978.
Guastaferro, K., *Melchior, M., *Murphy-Costanzo, A.S., *Sunshine, S., *Neimeyer, A., *Stewart, S., & Noll, J.G. (2023). Adapting prevention programs for virtual delivery: A case study in adapting a parent-focused child sexual abuse prevention module. Journal of Public Health Research, 12(4). DOI: 10.1177/22799036231208329
Guastaferro, K., *Shipe, S.L., Connell, C.M., Holloway, J., Pulido, M., & Noll, J.G. (2023). Knowledge gains from the implementation of a child sexual abuse prevention program and the future of school-based prevention education. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, 32(7), 845-859. DOI: 10.1080/10538712.2023.2268618
*Mozid, N. E., *Espinosa, R.N., *Grayson, C., *Falode, O., *Yang, Y., *Glaudin, G., & Guastaferro, K. (2024). Piloting an alternative implementation modality for a school-based child sexual abuse prevention curriculum. International Journal on Environmental Research and Public Health, 21(2), 149. DOI: 10.3390/ijerph21020149
Noll, J.G., Felt, J., Russotti, J., Guastaferro, K., Day, S., & Fisher, Z. (2025). Population-level reductions in child sexual abuse valid and invalid cases after a three-year coordinated, community-wide prevention initiative: Results from a synthetic control analysis. JAMA Pediatrics. DOI: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2024.6824
Shipe, S. L., Guastaferro, K., Noll, J. G., Connell, C. M., Morgan, P. L., & Crowley, D. M. (2022). Taking a school-based Child sexual abuse prevention program to scale: A cost analysis. Prevention Science, 23(8), 1394–1403. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11121-022-01401-4