Fall 2023 ChildFirst Missouri

The fall ChildFirst Missouri course will be held in the greater St. Louis region from October 23-27, 2023.

Missouri KidsFirst is the certified course provider in Missouri for ChildFirst®. The ChildFirst® Forensic Interviewing course is designed for investigative teams of law enforcement officers, social workers, prosecutors, and forensic interviewers. Students receive training on the ChildFirst® Forensic Interview Protocol, child development, memory and suggestibility, testifying in court, legal issues and preparing children for court. This training is the ChildFirst® Missouri Forensic Interviewing curriculum developed by the Zero Abuse Project and includes the ChildFirst® Forensic Interviewing protocol. This course is an interactive, intensive training that combines lecture with hands on experience. From the pre-course materials on linguistics, child development, memory, suggestibility and other pertinent topics, to required-reading in the form of homework each day, students are expected to study a significant amount of literature relating to child sexual abuse.

Things to know:

• This is an intensive course and includes lecture, discussion, review of actual interviewers, skill-building exercise, and role play interviews.
• This course is designed for those part of a multidisciplinary team, including law enforcement officers, social workers, prosecutors, child protection attorneys, investigators, and forensic interviewers.
• The workshops are supplemented with homework assignments and each student will be given a written examination at the end of the course. Students who fail to attend all workshops, to complete homework, to participate in training exercises, or to pass the examination will not be awarded a certificate of completion.
• Successful completion of ChildFirst® Forensic Interview Protocol training is only one component of the extensive training required to be a skilled forensic interviewer.
• 100% attendance is required to waive the tuition cost of $1000. There is a $150 registration fee for the course. Missouri KidsFirst applies for grant funding to cover the remaining tuition cost.

Attending this course alone does not qualify you to conduct forensic interviews. It is one piece of the forensic interviewer training process which requires ongoing skills-building, mentorship, and peer review.

Prior to registering for this course, interested participants must submit an application for approval by their local Child Advocacy Center (CAC). The application period for this course will open in the summer of 2023. For assistance connecting with your local CAC for an application, please contact Missouri KidsFirst at contact@missourikidsfirst.org