Since I could not bear to tear myself away from what has become my beloved city and workplace, I am continuing a local internship with the New Orleans Children’s Advocacy Center this summer. I fell in love with NOCAC when I began interning with them in January, in a small cottage facility a stone’s throw from Audubon Park, and a few minutes’ bike ride from Tulane in one direction and the Children’s Hospital in the other. This safe, peaceful environment is ideal for listening to the not-so safe and peaceful stories from children who visit the center for forensic medical exams and interviews conducted at NOCAC. The Center takes a multi-agency approach (meaning we talk to the Department of Children and Family Services, lawyers, sheriffs, and detectives throughout the South), to ensure safe, legally-sound solutions to the problems of abuse and neglect faced by the children we serve. The child-friendly environment at NOCAC lessens the stress and sadness experienced in this field by focusing on the resiliency of children, while at the same time pursuing their cases vigorously in order for them to achieve justice.
The past few months, I have learned how to use the essential databases NCATrak and PaperVision to record and organize patient information, record and develop accurate surveys to monitor patient and caregiver satisfaction and inquiries, 3D map location information in Excel, and transcribe forensic interviews. This last task is what I have spent most of my internship doing, and I expect to do more of it over the summer. It is also the task I feel has prepared me most for the field of law enforcement I want to pursue, because I have witnessed again and again how to conduct interviews with victims properly, so their accounts and disclosures are admissible in court as evidence. While heart-wrenching and sometimes nauseating, watching the forensic interviewers do their jobs so gracefully in order to protect their clients has solidified my desire to pursue a career in this field– a male-dominated one, and I am grateful to the majority-female staff at NOCAC for providing incredible role models and to NCI for allowing me to continue learning from them.
This summer, I have several goals, some of which are tangible ways I can help the center, and some of which are personal.
I want to apply knowledge from my political science major to help NOCAC, perhaps by completing a project with a long-lasting impact, such as updating abuse reporting mandates which is a goal the executive director has talked about. I want to learn how to write a grant for a non-profit, which is an essential skill to have if I want to help places like NOCAC continue to serve their communities. I want to use my newfound knowledge of Excel (which I should have learned way earlier in life) to create a map of where our cases come from. I want to learn about the publishing process by helping our director edit and publish the third book in a children’s series she has worked on. I want to gain a more nuanced understanding of where our cases go after they are passed from NOCAC to other agencies, and about the legal aspects of each case. And perhaps most importantly, I want to have the confidence to be able to intervene appropriately if I ever see violence or threats of violence in public.
I am looking forward to the hands-on learning this summer! Updates to come.
Here is a picture (found on the NOCAC website, because the office is somewhat off-limits to photography) of one of our beloved doctors, Dr. Mehta, in the main entrance hallway decorated with cheerful artwork.
