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Hello to any of you who have taken the time to read this thread.
Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Graham, I am a police constable with The Metropolitan Police Service. I have a beautiful daughter who is soon to turn three. Her mother and I are seperated and going through a divorce and I am having issues surrounding contact with my daughter.
But that is not what this is about!
I am sure, like me, many of you have been troubled by the recent story of the young girl who took her own life having been subjected to online abuse and bullying.
I am sure that many of you with older children worry about what they are doing online, who they are talking to, sharing pictures with etc. The internet world can be a wondeerful amazing place, but it can also be full of dangers.
As the summer holidays are due to draw to a close and parents, children and teachers prepare to go back to school I have pitched an idea to my Inspector that we prepare workshops and general advice and guidance to kids who, as they start to move toward young adult life, will inevitable be subject to certain temptations some of which may mean pushing the boundaries with crime.
I work on a Neighbourhood Policing team and as such we work closely with the community and schools. I would be looking to go into these schools and offer these workshops. We have also discussed other options such as websites or even an app where kids could safely report things to us the police.
While I appreciate that not all matters require police intervention I can only hope that this would give another avenue for a child suffering the effects of abuse. If its not a police issue we can certainly work closely with our partner agencies to resolve the matter.
Now, I hope you are sitting there thinking this is a fantastic idea, and I believe it can be but as my Inspector quite rightly pointed out...We would have to get kids interested in the first place... and in all honesty I have no idea what is going on in the mind of a kid.
So to that end I am asking any parent out there who has any ideas as to how we can tailor this to suit today's young people please do come forward. My inspector, sergeant and entire team are behind this idea and are giving it their full support.
We intend to approach some major businesses and internet companies to develop this... if it is a success who knows maybe it can be pushed out to other Police Services and maybe not just as a police constable but as a father we can start to fight back against those that would prey on our children.
Many thanks for taking the time to read this
Kindes regards
Graham
I think a good way to generate interest would be if you could get some celebs to endorse it.....they obviously don't have to appear in person but through posters etc... One Direction would be cool but maybe that's pitching it a bit high....but you get my drift! Maybe free iTunes downloads etc.
Hi Nannyjane,
Thats a fantastic idea and I had wondered about it myself. Certainly one direction would be a great endorsement seeing as how, no matter which way you turn you cant get away from them.
Not a faan myself but certainly something to consider... I also like the free itunes download idea too
Excellent thank you
Graham
Some of these big companies and teen idols will get kudos and coverage by endorsing your idea especially if it goes national. How about writing toSimon Cowell, he has lots of stars on his books and its just been announced that he is going to be a dad...
Good luck!
Hi,
Maybe target some major retailers too to who may be able to have Web sites details on their bags, the one that springs to mind for teens would be Primark if you managed to get them on board the amount of large paper bags movingly nd towns would generate some interest I'm sure.
Looking even larger facebook and twitter themselves would be a good place to try as they have to take some responsibility for what's happening.
GTTS
Liz mcClarnon from Atomic Kitten has been cyber stalked and Joss Stone...for these celebs it's personal.
Hi Graham,
I work in a school. As i'm sure you already may know, schools tend to be very open on ideas on these kind of things but often have very little time to staff them or attend to them. However, all is not lost here in my mind.
Most schools have a person or a department that deals with behaviour related matters. These people will know how best to pitch the ideas in their school.
The underling message here is, all schools know how their school works. How about approaching the schools directly and asking them?
It's simple, free and i bet you would be pleasantly surprised at the ideas they can come up with!!!
In our case, I think that we would actually ask the children directly.
I hope this helps a little
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