Hello everyone! This blog will document my summer research project on the role of child welfare agencies in addressing the commercial sexual exploitation of children. Thanks to the generous support of the Women and Public Policy Program’s Cultural Bridge Fellowship at the Harvard Kennedy School, I’ll be spending this summer doing research on recent legislation in Kentucky that gave the state’s child welfare agency the responsibility of investigating and addressing the needs of commercially sexually exploited children (CSEC). My research will explore why the legislature decided to pass CSEC legislation, why the state's child welfare agency was given responsibility for CSEC cases, what the successes and challenges with implementing this law have been, and important considerations for state legislatures considering adopting similar policies. I plan to conduct interviews with key staff members in Kentucky's child welfare agency, juvenile court system, and juvenile justice agency, as well as service providers, family and district court judges, prosecutors, school leaders, victim advocates who work with the CSEC population in Kentucky, and other stakeholders who were involved in the development of HB 3. I will also review the literature on best practices and evidence-based policies in human trafficking, sex trafficking and CSEC issues. I will conduct this research under the supervision of Julie Wilson, Harry Kahn Senior Lecturer in Social Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School.
