Impact 2025-2026 : ACE met en relation les jeunes survivants avec des services de soutien

Nearly half of KCSARC’s clients are children and teens under 18, and trusted adults working in schools are frequently those who first hear a disclosure. Yet, too often, young survivors are not connected to vital support as reports and investigations begin. Shifting that point of connection up much earlier in the process is one of our top priorities.

Delayed connections to support mean that a young survivor, often one without a strong parent or caregiver behind them, is thrust into a legal system built for adults. It’s a system that is confusing, slow and unforgiving. By the time one of our advocates is connected with a young survivor, too often the young person’s heartbreaking response is: I thought no one cared or could help.  It’s no surprise, then, that many survivors walk away from their own case before it even begins. And without their cooperation, prosecutors can’t move forward. That leaves trauma unaddressed, safety at risk, and the person who caused harm free to do it again.

A survivor who has someone beside them from day one — someone who explains their rights, prepares them for what’s ahead, and connects them to emotional support — is a survivor who can find their voice, and be heard when they use it. And when young survivors connect to advocacy early, outcomes, both emotional and legal, change dramatically.

That led KCSARC to launch a new program in 2025. Our Advocacy, Connection & Engagement (ACE) program exists to close that early gap, reaching survivors at the moment of disclosure rather than months later. We’re focused first on the young people most likely to fall through the cracks — including youth in foster care — by tackling a surprisingly simple barrier: making sure the adults most likely to hear first disclosures know about KCSARC and the importance of early connection and advocacy.

In partnership with Atlantic Street Center, El Centro de la Raza and others, we’ve proactively and systematically reached out to school-based professionals. The results so far show promise: in schools we’ve reached in the last year, 268 students, ages 11 to 17 were connected to support. That includes young survivors involved in foster care who may not have supportive family; we continue to analyze data on that front. Every one of these young people received trauma-informed, age-appropriate, culturally responsive support from the very start — emotional support, legal advocacy, referrals for protection orders and civil legal aid, and someone tracking their case every step of the way.

This is just the beginning. Every early connection is a young survivor given a fighting chance — and we’re only getting started.

Learn more about the impact we made in 2025-26 here.