CAP History
The Child Assault Prevention (CAP) Project originated in 1978, in Columbus, Ohio, as a project of Women Against Rape (WAR). At the time the organization was responding to a plea by parents and staff to a parochial school in which a second grader had been raped. Offering emotional support and empowering prevention information, the staff at WAR developed the original Child Assault Prevention (CAP) curriculum. In 1984, Ms. Magazine published an article about the successes of the CAP program. The following is a true situation that was featured in the article:
Twelve-year-old Tanya and her eight-year-old brother Marcus were walking home from school together. Two adolescent boys attacked them and tried to drag Tanya off the sidewalk and into a yard. Without hesitation, both kids started shouting a deep, guttural self-defense yell while Tanya kicked and fought to get loose. The young attackers ran away.Tanya and Marcus escaped harm because they had participated in a Child Assault Prevention (CAP) workshop in Columbus, Ohio, the summer before. Though shaken by the attempted assault, they had learned real skills that changed the outcome of a dangerous situation just as clearly as teaching children how to cross streets prevents many pedestrian accidents. Tanya and Marcus were the first children we heard about who had actually used the information we taught to prevent assault. They were not the last. Since that incident CAP success stories have become commonplace and have proved CAP’s effectiveness to prevent abuse against children. Today, CAP has trained facilitators in 32 states and 18 countries and is considered to be one of America’s most innovative and comprehensive prevention programs. It is presently disseminated nationwide by the National/International Center for Assault Prevention. (NCAP/ICAP)
NCAP/ICAP is a project of the Educational Information & Resource Center in Sewell, NJ.