Our Story
Learn to Be Safe with Emmy & Friends is a protective behaviours program that helps keep kids safe.
Act for Kids and Emmy & Friends
Our program has helped more than 62,000 kids learn about personal safety.
Act for Kids developed our personal safety program based on best available research about protective behaviours. While first offered as part of our Sexual Abuse Counselling service, the program is not just about preventing sexual abuse. This program gives children knowledge and skills to speak up if they are being hurt or abused.
We have been delivering the program in Queensland schools since 2008, and around Australia since 2014. In that time we have reached more than 62,000 students.
Our journey so far
Learn to be Safe with Emmy and Friends is a proud part of Act for Kids – an Australian for-purpose organisation that delivers support services to children and families.
The school where I teach has been involved in the Learn to Be Safe with Emmy & Friends program for years and I feel this is the most wonderful program. It is very child-friendly and the messages in it are relayed in such a simple way. The program relays pertinent messages that all children today need to know about.
I would recommend Learn to Be Safe with Emmy & Friends to anybody, it really is amazing.
Hazel Gruskin, educator and supporter of LTBSWEF
Our Research
Learn to BE SAFE with Emmy and Friends has undergone multiple rigorous evaluations including a multisite randomized controlled trial.
Act for Kids saw how useful Learn to BE SAFE with Emmy and Friends could be, and wanted to gather stronger evidence about the benefits of the program.
We worked with Griffith University on a small study to test the program. The study used a randomised control trial to see how well the program improved children’s knowledge and skills about staying safe.
245 Grade 1 students from 15 classrooms in 5 schools.
Children knew more about staying safe and made better choices in unsafe situations.
Parents noticed their children used more safety strategies.
This led to a larger study funded by an Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage Grant. We partnered with Griffith University, James Cook University, and Queensland University of Technology for a bigger trial.
611 Grade 1 students from 72 classrooms in 24 schools.
Children knew more about interpersonal safety and safety skills.
Children felt more confident about speaking up (disclosure confidence).
Read more about our research:
- Dale, R., Shanley, D.C., Zimmer-Gembeck, M.J., Lines, K., Pickering, K., White, C. (2016). Empowering and protecting children by enhancing knowledge, skills and well-being: A randomized trial of Learn to be safe with Emmy. Child Abuse & Neglect, 51, 368-378. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2015.07.016
- Walsh, K., Zwi, K., Woolfenden, S., & Shlonsky, A. (2015). School-based education programmes for the prevention of child sexual abuse. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Issue 4. Art. No: CD004380. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD004380.pub3
- White, C., Shanley, D.C., Zimmer-Gembeck, M.J., Lines, K., Walsh, K., & Hawkins, R. (2016). Cluster randomised-control trial for an Australian child protection education program: Study protocol for the Learn to be safe with Emmy and friendsTM. BMC Public Health, 16(72). DOI: 10.1186/s12889-016-2721-x
- White, C., Shanley, D.C., Zimmer-Gembeck, M.J., Walsh, K., Hawkins, R., Lines, K., & Webb, H. (2018b). Promoting young children’s interpersonal safety knowledge, intentions, confidence, and protective behavior skills: Outcomes of a randomized controlled trial. Child Abuse & Neglect, 82, 144-55.
- White, C., Shanley, D.C., Zimmer-Gembeck, M.J., Walsh, K., Hawkins, R., & Lines, K. (2018b). Outcomes of In Situ training for disclosure as a standalone and a booster to a child protective behaviors education program. Child Maltreatment, 24(2), 193-202. DOI: 10.1177/1077559518816877
With thanks to our supporters
