Welcome to Association of Child Protection Professionals' Podcast, a podcast where we, alongside guest hosts, share with you the latest in child and family safeguarding.
In today's episode Wendy Thorogood, Chair of the Association of Child Protection Professionals, talks to Dr Aravinda Kosaraju about child sexual exploitation and how professionals can support families to prevent it.
Dr Aravinda Kosaraju is a qualified lawyer and social worker specialising in Criminology, with many years of experience working with national and international non-governmental organisations including Parents against Child Sexual Exploitation, Lawyer's Collective and the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative.
Aravinda has researched extensively into child sexual exploitation, sex trafficking and was involved in various policy reform initiatives in India and the UK. She has also developed multi-agency practitioner training on safeguarding children from sexual exploitation. Her research draws from critical perspectives in law and criminology broadly engaging with issues of: violence against women and children; criminal justice responses to sexual offending; and safeguarding children policy and practice. Her PhD thesis examined the process of attrition in cases involving crimes of child sexual exploitation in England and Wales.
Aravinda is a Lecturer in Advanced Child Protection at the University of Kent's Centre for Child Protection. Her current research focuses on: supporting sexually exploited children through criminal justice; effective investigation and prosecution of sexual offences against children; and working with children on the move.
Wendy Thorogood is a retired Designated Nurse Consultant for children with NHS Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) based in Dorchester. She trained at St Guy's hospital in London, specialising in child and adult nursing intensive care and cardiac and renal transplants.
Wendy delivered the national leadership programme for safeguarding for the Department of Health and worked directly with the NHS Confederation in relation to current changes, including: providing assurance that current and future providers of services are compliant in relation to safeguarding national and local standards; working with Lead Commissioners and the performance team to develop agreed key performance indicators and safety metrics for providers; and identifying and taking appropriate action on key risks and issues across commissioned services that may affect safeguarding of children and young people.
Wendy has also spent time working in a maternity unit in South Africa in a maternity unit and a Special Care Baby Unit (SCBU) in Kent. She has also worked with drug users to improve maternal care - a project that still runs today.
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