4 LTS....For Lynda Taylor Smith

Florida has such a great design for their STOP CHILD ABUSE tag.  While we lived there for five years, this was our tag.  4 LTS...which stood for Four Lynda Taylor Smith.  I taught pre-kindergarden developmentally delayed students at Eglin Air Force Base.  This was very much a military community.  Often I was asked if I had four lieutenants in the Air Force.  For a couple of minutes I was puzzled because I temporarily forgot where I was.  Then I understood why someone would ask that question.

I have an autism tag in Mississippi.  Lynda's child abuse has never been far from my thoughts.  We as a state, a nation and the world have to treat our children as the treasures they are.  Politicians talk about how our children are our future but continue to cut funds for education.  Our model for child welfare is broken leaving far too many children falling through the cracks.  Foster children in the United States are turned out on the streets at age 18 with no back-up system.  Children adopted can be re-homed in an underground system of child predators and mentally unstable adults who have lost the privilege of parenting their own children.  Child trafficking is as prevalent in the United States as other countries and we continue to pretend that the United States is the home of the brave and the land of the free.  Not if you are a child.  As a child you  are dependent on adults to protect you and even when they try as we did for Lynda it still can  happen.  Can you imagine the children who have no one to advocate for them and suffer daily?

Research shows that children with special needs are one of the largest groups of children to be abused in schools.  Those with behavior problems and are hyperactive as Lynda was are prime targets.  You can be a protector of children in your care and those you encounter in your community.  It is the law to report any suspected child abuse.  You do not have to prove it but you are legally bound to report anything that you know about.  It's not a choice of whether you want to get involved or not.  It's the law.  Think about yourself as a child.  Think about being abused.  What would you want someone to do for you?

In every incident of abuse with Lynda someone saw what was happening but chose not to get involved.  Someone could have stopped the abuse of Lynda as a young child when she lived with her biological family in Brewton, Alabama.  Someone could have stopped the abuse at the South Panola County Child Development Center in Batesville, Mississippi and someone could have stopped the abuse at Millcreek Rehabilitation Center in Magee, Mississippi.  Lynda's future could have been very different had someone been willing to stand up for her.  Don't turn away from suspected child abuse.  A child's future may very well hinge on whether you report it or walk away.

Do it for Lynda Taylor Smith.