Sara Austin, named to Canada’s Most Powerful Women, on child advocacy
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Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100 Awards will once again showcase the nation’s leaders helping to drive positive change. At a special awards luncheon in Calgary on Feb. 13, several Calgary women will be honoured, including Sara Austin — CEO with the Sheldon Kennedy Child Advocacy Centre. Austin has spent a lifetime advocating for children from her overseas work with World Vision and as founder of Children First Canada. As a three-time winner of the Top 100, Austin has led global advocacy campaigns and shaped international public policy. She spent some time with Postmedia’s Eva Ferguson to talk about her career path and her advocacy. The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
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1. As a young woman, just starting to think about your career path, what inspired you to become an advocate for children?
For me, there was always a sense of vocation, a calling that this is what I was meant to do. Even in my earliest years as a child I had a number of really profound experiences that made me realize the importance of helping others. When I was only four years old, my family fostered a family from Laos, as part of the boat people crisis in 1979. We developed close bonds and we stayed in touch for many years. I also worked as a summer camp counsellor and one of the kids I was looking after disclosed to me that she had been sexually abused. I helped her report the abuse and got the authorities involved so she wouldn’t have to go back to a dangerous situation. I learned about the importance of being a voice for children who were afraid to speak for themselves. I felt this sense of responsibility, even a solidarity, with other children that they all had a right to grow up in a safe and loving home and to go to school and be protected.
2. How did those childhood lessons translate to some of the groundbreaking work you have done with World Vision and with Children First?
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Through my work with World Vision, I travelled to many places around the world working to help children exploited through child labour, sex trafficking, prostitution. Kids in Africa faced with HIV and AIDS because of prostitution. This was during the 1990s when access to medical treatment for AIDS wasn’t there yet. It was difficult work. So many of the kids I worked with I got to know them personally. And I had to watch them pass away. But for over eight years I advocated to change international law advocating for children’s rights. I was part of launching a global campaign to pass a law that any child up to 18 years of age could file a complaint against their government if their rights were being denied. Finally, in 2014, it was passed at the United Nations.
3. What about your work now in Canada? What is the state of children and their quality of life here?
There is a misperception that kids in Canada are doing just fine. There hasn’t been a lot of public education to engage Canadians, so we struggle with the reality, we tend to diminish it. So there’s a huge opportunity to raise awareness and the message is that the kids are not all right. A million kids in our country are affected by a range of issues not just affecting our current quality of life but the long-term health and well-being of our entire population. We have one in five kids living in poverty.
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4. How pervasive is child abuse, especially in terms of what you’re seeing now in your work at the Sheldon Kennedy Child Advocacy Centre?
Calgarians are astounded when they hear the numbers. One in three kids have experienced some form of abuse and at the centre we are focused on support and treatment. On any given month now we are seeing 120 new cases of abuse. In the first five years we have had more than 6,000 cases. The majority of our cases, kids have been abused by someone they know. But there’s so much fear and stigma, they are afraid to come forward. We’re trying to raise awareness among those who suspect a problem and to understand the importance of reporting it.
5. What is the advocacy centre doing to help educate kids and those who are close to them?
We launched a fantastic resource in schools in October helping keep kids safe. We developed a tool kit, a video that goes along with a discussion and guide educating people about the signs of abuse and what you need to do to report it. It helps adults who work directly in the care of children to understand what their responsibilities are. There’s so much misperception around what to do and people worry there is risk if their suspicions aren’t justified. This gives everyone tools and common language on how to handle those situations.
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6. What are your thoughts on the #MeToo movement and how it is helping raise awareness around abuse?
Anything that puts this into the public conversation is important. It helps us come to terms with how prevalent it is. We need to make it a public issue so there is no more stigma associated with it. Even for women in the workplace, the #MeToo conversation and speaking out is so important. I have experienced discrimination and harassment in the workplace, like many of us have. We’ve all had crude things said to us. We’ve felt discrimination. But my experience isn’t unique, which is what is so disturbing. But as we all begin to tell our stories there will be change in the workplace.
- Other women receiving awards at the Women’s Executive Network Calgary event on Sept. 13 include Carolyn Graham, Gianna Manes, Rachel Mielke, Melinda Park and Geeta Sankappanavar.
- The event, at the Westin, also includes panels, luncheons and key note addresses; click here for more information.
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