Rotary Receives Recognition from School Board for Financial Contribution in Ongoing Fight Against Human Trafficking

A darkness creeps along the I-81 corridor, known as human trafficking. “It scares the p*** out of me,” said Warren County Rotary Club President Michael Williams in a phone interview prior to the evening of Wednesday, February 7, when, in the course of a regular meeting at the Warren County Government Center, the school board recognized the financial contributions made by Rotary at both town and county levels to cover the expense of a curriculum designed to fight human trafficking and thereby protect the county’s school children. The board proceeded to vote unanimously in favor of implementing the money to make the curriculum effective.

Warren County School Board meets on Wednesday evening for a regular meeting. Royal Examiner Photo Credits: Brenden McHugh

According to Williams, the idea was born out of a game of golf in which Rick Novak, owner of Royal Cinemas and former Front Royal Rotary Club president, told Superintendent Christopher Ballenger about the Anti-Trafficking International (ATI) curriculum that he had discovered. “He was all in,” Williams said, speaking of Ballenger’s reaction.

“The evil is still there,” Williams said at one point in our conversation. Modern slavery has been thriving for several decades, and the refusal of many parents to recognize it as the threat that it truly is, in Williams’ mind, is idiotic. “You’re a fricking idiot,” he wishes he could say to them. By keeping their heads firmly in the sand, he believes these parents are setting up their children to be groomed.

Assistant Superintendent of Instruction with Warren County Public Schools Heather Bragg stands with Warren County Rotary Club President Michael Williams as she recognizes Front Royal and Warren County Rotary clubs for their recent financial contribution to a curriculum designed to fight human trafficking.

When Rotary saw that the cost of implementing the curriculum for a three-year period was five thousand dollars, they immediately offered to cover it. The county-level Rotary and the town-level Rotary each, in turn, covered twenty-five hundred dollars of the expense. ATI’s “Just Ask” curriculum brings expertise into the schools as their agents meet with educational institutions to determine their specific needs and tailor the curriculum accordingly. One of the focuses of this curriculum is inviting children to become more analytical about online technology and the potential exploitative dangers it presents.

The children may not be memorizing the poetry of George Herbert, but they will be learning important lessons about the philosophy of “just ask.” At any given time, there are children suffering under modern slavery who have been inducted into a dark world, often by means of the technological devices that appear so innocent. These children’s grades may suffer as they exhibit a range of other symptoms that their friends and caregivers misinterpret. Learning to identify those symptoms and simply ask the child the right questions while also developing barricades in each child’s life to the possibility of being exploited is ATI’s core mission. This curriculum will be especially relevant to tenth, eleventh, and twelfth graders in the Warren County Public Schools system.

As for Rotary, combating human trafficking is a core issue. The Rotary Club Against Slavery, of which Sheriff Crystal Cline is a member, serves as an important impediment in our region to trafficking. Williams mentioned that Rotary members recently viewed the film Sound of Freedom as part of an effort to raise awareness. Because of people like Ballenger, Novak, Williams, and Cline, the illicit trafficking on the I-81 corridor cannot boast that it enjoys perfect security.