Secondary school teachers have a challenging and critically important job: prepare adolescents to take on the world. Considering the dynamics involved with both teenagers and the world, we should hug the teachers we know and thank them for what they do. Next, we give them another important job-- helping to create the first line of defense against human trafficking in our communities.

Teen angst has been around forever (Google: "Gidget"), but the world surrounding teenagers has grown much more complicated than it used to be. Police officers are, perhaps, most familiar with the world’s modern complications and they see firsthand how children can become entangled in them. If you speak to vice officers in almost any American metropolis, they will tell you that children are increasingly the target of commercial sexual exploitation – a disturbingly common form of human trafficking. In fact, Atlanta is now a major hub for child sex trafficking in the United States.

There is encouraging news about the intervention side of the sex trafficking dilemma - governmental agencies and non-governmental organizations have become increasingly proactive in identifying, rescuing and restoring victims. There’s been very little discussion (and even less investment), however, on developing strategies for prevention and early intervention of this insidious crime. With a prostituted person being forced into "the life," on average, between the ages of 13 and 15, preparing young people to avoid such dangers at or before the point of entry may be the key to ending slavery in our communities. In addition to the obvious benefits of helping circumvent the physical and emotional torment of being trafficked, prevention education can be delivered at a fraction of the financial and social costs of restoring victims.

Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives' (FDFI) curriculum, History, Human Rights and the Power of One (HHRPO) is based in the history of slavery in the United States--teaching students the basic historical realities of slavery in our own country and other modern-day forms of slavery in the U.S. and across the globe. If you are interested in obtaining free copies of HHRPO, please let us know by contacting us at the web address below. HHRPO is based in the Common Core Standards and has been approved for use in the New York City Public Schools and other schools across the nation. Students and teachers are being inspired and activated while learning valuable skills and becoming empowered to fight a problem they most likely already see, but don't understand. Thank you for your important work with our country's future abolitionists!