McLean Businesses Join Campaign to Raise Awareness of Child Abuse

April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month, and a number of McLean businesses and faith groups have joined the Pinwheels for Prevention campaign by partnering locally with Stop Child Abuse Now of Northern Virginia to raise awareness and educate the community about the power of prevention.

Betsy and Cornelia’s Consignments, McLean Automotive Service Center, McLean Baptist Church, Rocco’s Pizza, Serenity Salon and Sweet Leaf are all official Pinwheel Partners. The businesses are selling pinwheels for $2, with the proceeds to benefit SCAN and raise awareness about the role people can play in valuing children and strengthening families.

McLean Baptist Church planted a pinwheel garden as part of their Easter services and is hosting a child sexual abuse prevention training with SCAN on April 20.

The pinwheel is a symbol of childhood and is being used in this campaign as a symbolic reminder of the importance of child abuse and neglect prevention. There were almost 53,000 cases of possible abuse and neglect reported in Virginia over a 12-month period ending last June. Of those, 28 children died, and 23 of them were age 4 or younger.

“That’s an alarming number that we must do something about,” said McLean resident and SCAN Public Education Committee member Rev. Trisha Miller Manari in a press release. “I'm thankful that local businesses are donating their time to educate the public and help raise funds to support SCAN’s many programs. Regardless of whether you’re a parent—every individual can do something to help children grow up safe and healthy.”

Child abuse is often thought of as only physical harm, but it also includes emotional abuse that impairs a child’s emotional development and self-worth, and neglect, which is failure to provide for a child’s basic needs including physical, educational and emotional needs.  

Manarin added, “Some instances of abuse come from parents or caregivers who are under extreme stress, maybe just lost a job and need help learning or improving their skills to be a supportive, positive parent or caregiver, as well as techniques for managing and reducing stress, all of which SCAN offers through its community programs.”

“SCAN relies on the support of our community to help us promote the wellbeing of children, improve parent-child relations and prevent child abuse and neglect in Northern Virginia through SCAN’s educational programs and advocacy,” said Sonia Quiñónez, SCAN’s executive director, in a news release. “As today’s economic environment has caused cuts to government and foundation giving, we especially appreciate the efforts of these businesses whose contributions help sustain our critical programs for vulnerable families.”

SCAN’s Parent Education Program strengthens families by building parenting skills through classes, workshops and support groups. The Court Appointed Special Advocate Program gives abused or neglected children a voice through well-trained, well-supervised volunteer advocates.

SCAN’s Public Education Program engages parents and community members across the Northern Virginia region in preventing abuse and promoting positive parenting. In addition, SCAN provides child sexual abuse prevention training to adults to help them prevent, recognize and respond to this type of abuse.