I took the Safe Gatherings training last night. I thought it was really great. I’ve taken training in a few different settings and never received this much information. I thought it was really well done, eye-opening and a little scary. I think that all of our church volunteers (and staff) should take this training. Thank you for providing something so meaningful and helpful.
We have found Safe Gatherings a great tool, and it has met an immediate need for our parents. Since we are a church plant, it provides trust because the volunteers and background checked and trained. So even though we are just beginning, they have a trust of the deeper level of vetting completed on those working with their children.
Using the Safe Gatherings abuse prevention training program at our church this year has compiled and organized our training so that everyone is trained with the same material. This is most helpful to eliminate any misunderstandings. Our church has over 70 trained volunteers and we are a small church! Safe Gatherings is very friendly, helpful and available to answer any questions or work through any issues.
I feel that the greatest strength of Safe Gatherings is the abuse prevention and boundary awareness training. Another benefit is record retention. The liability and exposure that a church has in retaining personal information on the applicants is reduced. Existing programs generally only cover background checks, reference checks, and policies to which must be adhered.