Polaris Project's Fellowship Program

Polaris Project's Fellowship Program is recognized as one of the premiere leadership development programs focused on the issues of human trafficking and modern day slavery. The program provides young adults with training and on-the-ground practical experience in the anti-trafficking movement.

Applicants range from undergraduate students to retired attorneys from around the world and throughout the United States. At the beginning of each session, Fellows receive more than 40 hours of intensive training on human trafficking as well as program-specific training related to their particular position. Once trained, Fellows are integrated into the daily operations of their program and engage in meaningful projects and continuing education activities within the anti-trafficking movement.

All fellowships are unpaid, and most are designed as full-time positions. Since the fellowship program's inception in Spring 2003, more than 400 Fellows have completed the Fellowship Program, many of whom have gone on to take prominent positions in the anti-trafficking movement.

Washington, DC
Executive Assistant Fellowship
Communications and Media Fellowship
Social Media Fellowship
Policy and Legal Fellowship
Training/Technical Assistance and Research Fellowship
National Human Trafficking Hotline Fellowship
Information Technology (IT) Fellowship
Operations and Non-Profit Management Development Fellowship
Policy Implementation and Coordination Fellowship
Japan Liaison Fellowship
Program Liaison Fellowship
Client Services Operations Fellowship
Foundation and Grants Fellowship

New Jersey
Public Outreach and Communications Fellowship
Client Services Fellowship T

he Fellowships run January 13-May 13. Early application deadline is December 10. and the final application deadline is January 10.

For answers to frequently asked questions, click here.

Get Involved: HTP Content Contributors

Help build the Human Trafficking Project into an informational resource of news articles, analysis and insights for researchers and individuals interested in learning more about trafficking!

Are you a researcher? A student? A social worker? An advocate? A lawyer? A volunteer?

We are looking for gifted writers who are passionate about raising awareness of human trafficking and are ready and willing to provide analysis on current efforts to combat trafficking, report on new, innovative anti-trafficking strategies, interview organizations around the world that are making a difference, review trafficking news articles, attend and report on trafficking-related conferences and in general share their opinions and insights on everything that is trafficking (whew, that was a lot in one sentence).

We can't promise you fame and fortune (although site traffic is steadily growing, these are unpaid positions), but we can promise a forum where you can help raise awareness of trafficking and have your opinions heard.

Direct experience in the field is appreciated but by no means required. There is a lot of work to do and a lot of awareness to raise- together we can make a difference!

Time commitment is approximately 5 hours per week.

Please email a sample blog (e.g. what would you write for your first HTP post?) and a brief description of your experience and interest in trafficking to writers@traffickingproject.org.

Thank you for your continued support!

The HTP Team

Courtney's House Volunteer Opportunities

Courtney's House has two upcoming trainings for volunteers. According to its website, the organization was founded by Tina Frundt, a survivor of of domestic child sex trafficking. Courtney's House is projected to be a six-bed long-term group home for sex trafficked girls between the ages of 12 and 17. It will be the only group home of its kind in the Washington, DC area to cater specifically to this vital population segment. Courtney's House also offers mentoring, support groups and other programs for survivors, and conducts a street outreach program.

Volunteers interested in helping with direct services or street outreach can apply to attend training sessions.

Mentor Training/Direct Service Training Feb. 20th 10am-3pm, Location TBA.
This training is for people interested in mentoring, art therapy, dance therapy, sewing classes, etc. You must be 21 years or over; male or female. Email jkimball@courtneyshouse.org for information.

Street Outreach Training March 22-March 28 6:30pm-8pm Mon-Thurs. Special Training Friday, Marcy 27. Location TBA. March 28 Self-Defense Class 3pm-6pm.
Requires at least a three-month commitment. You must be 21 years or over; female volunteers only. If you are interested in applying for the training, please email jkimball@courtneyshouse.org.

For information about other volunteer opportunities with Courtney's House, visit their website.

Event: L.A. Marathon with Survivors and CAST

The Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking (CAST) is participating in the L.A. Marathon on March 21 along with survivors of human trafficking. CAST would like to more participants to become involved. They are looking for runners, race-day volunteers, and sponsors. For more details, visit http://www.castla.org/la-marathon.

California - Human Trafficking Prevention Month Events

If you live in California, it's not too late to get involved in Human Trafficking Prevention Month, thanks to the San Francisco Collaborative Against Human Trafficking, and the Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking:

San Francisco:

February 6, 2010 - "Building the Wings of Freedom" benefit dinner for Freedom House, a nonprofit that is opening a shelter for victims of human trafficking. 6:00 pm at Dolores Park Church. www.freedom-house.us.com.

February 9, 2010 - Panel discussion: "In Our Backyard: Recognizing and Combating Human Trafficking in San Francisco." The focus will be on providing ways for members of the public to identify and assist trafficking victims. 5:30 pm at the Koret Auditorium at the San Francisco Public Library main branch. http://www.sf-hrc.org/index.aspx?page=58

Los Angeles:

January 20, 2010 - UCLA Trafficking Awareness Panel Discussion Speaker Event, featuring speakers Dr. Susie Baldwin, Stephanie Richard of CAST, and a CAST survivor advisory caucus member. 6:00-7:30 pm at UCLA campus. http://www.castla.org/ucla-panel-on-public-health.

January 21, 2010 - Certain Jamba Juice locations will donate 20% of sales to CAST for those who bring in the flier. http://www.castla.org/jamba-juice-to-donate-20percent-to-cast.

January 23, 2010 - CAST community clothing and basic necessities drive for trafficking survivors. Needed items include bus passes, gift cards, toiletries, laundry detergent, diapers, and children's clothing. Volunteers are also needed. http://www.castla.org/community-clothing-and-basic-necessities-drive--el-segundo.

Announcement for Volunteer Opportunity at RestoreNYC (Jan. 14th 2010)

Are you in NYC area? Are you interested in supporting human trafficking victims? Are you looking for an opportunity to build your experience with hands on experience in the field? Restore NYC is inviting you to NYC to join their session to be held on Thursday, January 14th. at 7 pm. During the session, Faith Huckel, the Executive Director of the organization will speak about the organization, including its mission statement as well as the organization's plan to combat sex trafficking in NYC. The purpose of this session is to build a safe house for human trafficking victims in NYC.

More on Restore NYC
According to its website, the organization was started in 2004 when three people felt called to serve human trafficking victims in New York City. After receiving training, the organization obtained its nonprofit status in 2006. Since then, the organization has dedicated itself to assisting victims of trafficking to restore themselves from physical and psychological damages caused by their experience in prostitution and sex trafficking. Restore also became the first organization in NYC to provide holistic long-term aftercare services and house care for international women victimized by human trafficking.

If you would like to get involved
The volunteer opportunities include accounting, blogging for its website, case managing, mentoring, supporting with prayers and prayer walk, and assisting with recreational outings and workshop instruction. If you are interested, e-mail Restore at restorevolunteer@gmail.com to complete the volunteer application. You are also encouraged to attend the session this Thursday, January 14th at 7 pm. For more information on the opportunity, visit RestoreNYC

Courtney's House

In the US, the average age of entry into the commercial sex industry is 12 years old, according to the US Department of Justice.Under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, commercial sex with anyone under the age of 18 is automatically trafficking, since minors are not of age to give meaningful consent; had no money changed hands, these would be cases of statutory rape.

Unfortunately, many survivors of commercial sexual exploitation of a minor (CSEC) are either treated as criminals or lack access to services. Courtney's House in the DC metro area is working to address this issue.

"I remember being 10 years old and my mother putting makeup on me and telling me she loved me, then opening her bedroom door where a man sat there waiting for me. My mother then put me in the room and closed the door. She told me it wouldn't take long."
-- Kelly, 17 years old. Survivor Testimonial (Courtney's House Fundraising Letter).

According to Courtney's House, "One of the largest forms of domestic sex trafficking in the U.S. involves traffickers who coerce children to enter the commercial sex industry through the use of a variety of recruitment and control mechanisms in strip clubs, street-based prostitution, escort services and brothels." Pimps and other child traffickers tend to prey on runaways and homeless youth, because these children are particularly vulnerable. However, traffickers do not only target these populations.

Courtney's House defines the commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) as consisting of "sexual abuse by adults and payment in cash or kind to the child, or a third person or persons, and is a fundamental violation of children’s rights. Commercial sexual exploitation is a contemporary form of child slavery."

"I'm not sure if I was 5 or when my mother started selling me to men. Usually, she sold me for small amounts of drugs. When I was 13 years old, I ran away and met a man 20 years my senior, who told me he would take care of me. However, it wasn't long before he made me work on the street I had to bring a quota of $800 every night.
- Beth, 17 years old. Survivor Testimonial (Courtney's House Fundraising Letter)

The Courtney's House Initiative started in August 2008 to comprehensively address the needs of CSEC survivors and to end domestic sex trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation of all children. Founded by Tina Fundt, a survivor of domestic minor sex trafficking, the organization focuses on providing long-term shelter for sex trafficked girls between the ages of 11 and 17.

Courtney's House also works to raise awareness and conducts street outreach to connect with current CSEC victims. In addition to providing shelter, Courtney's House includes counseling and educational services, and aftercare services for participants as they transition out of Courtney's House.

Currently, Courtney's House is preparing to open its doors in January, 2010. In the interim, they "remain committed. . . to providing girls with the skills and safe environment required to get them out of their trafficking situations so that they can go on to live healthy, happy lives."

"When I was 14 years old, my mom asked me to get some things from the store. I took a little longer than I thought. When I came out of the store it was getting dark. A man approached me in a car and asked me if I needed a ride. I said 'no'and crossed the street. He followed me for about 3 or 4 blocks, and then he got out of the car. I ran but he caught me and threw me into the trunk of the car. I never knew what a pimp was before that day."
- Tammy, 16 years old. Survivor Testimony (Courtney's House Fundraising Letter)

As Courtney's House prepares to open its doors and to build on the service it is already providing to survivors, it needs assistance. Currently, Courtney's House is looking for volunteers to help with fundraising, events, and awareness. Women 21+ can also help with their street outreach program.

Courtney's House will host a Youth Rally on September 19th, and Courtney's House is involved in the September 26th Stop Child Trafficking Now Walk.

Courtney's House is also seeking giftcard donations to stores like Target and Old Navy to help provide clothing for program participants and to restaurants to cover meals before and after medical appointments. Any giftcard amount would be greatly appreciated:

Courtney's House
P.O. Box 12054
Washington, DC 20005
info@courtneyshouse.org
If you would like to volunteer or donate contact:
Natasha Adams
Development Coordinator
nadams@courtneyshouse.org

"Be the Change" on Gandhi's Birthday

Here's a great chance to "be the change you wish to see in the world": the Kids with Cameras Foundation is looking for volunteers to host "House Parties for Hope" on October 2 - Gandhi's 140th birthday. Kids with Cameras is the foundation that grew out of the award-winning documentary Born into Brothels, which follows the lives of several children of prostitutes in Calcutta's red-light district who are given video cameras and taught how to use them. Through a partnership with the Buntain Foundation, Kids with Cameras is now working to build "Hope House," which is a "landmark endeavor to house up to 100 girls who are daughters of prostitutes from the same red-light district featured in the film. Hope House will give them access to on-site physical and psychological care, as well as formal mentorship from nursing students from an adjacent College of Nursing, all on a quiet, rustic campus on the city's outskirts. Each girl will have a full scholarship for private school education through high school, as well as access to computer labs, English language instruction and art, film and photography classes."

To complete the project, Hope House needs to raise the remaining $690,000 of its $1.2 million goal--and that's where you can help, by joining others from all over the world in hosting or attending a screening of Born into Brothels at a House Party for Hope. All proceeds from the house parties will go directly to Hope House's Capital Campaign.

Says Ross Kauffman, co-director and producer of Born into Brothels: "I hope all of the film's fans and our past supporters will join us in this unprecedented effort to raise the completion funds to build Hope House. It was a dream of ours as we made the film to have a place for these children to learn and grow. The dream is close to becoming a reality. There is no better way for anyone that watches the film and falls in love with these kids, just as we did, to make a difference in their future."

To learn more about hosting or attending a House Party for Hope, please visit http://www.kids-with-cameras.org/. For more information on Hope House, visit http://www.kids-with-cameras.org/school.

DC Stop Child Trafficking Now Walk September 26th

On Saturday, September 26th 2009, the DC abolitionist community will come together for the first annual DC Stop Child Trafficking Now Walk. September is Combating Human Trafficking Month, and the DC walk will be part of national anti-trafficking efforts, including walks in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Dallas, according to the walk's website.

According to Ray Lian of Stop Modern Slavery, one of the organizations planning the event, the walk has two main goals. First, it aims to bring together the DC anti-trafficking community, including NGOs, local authorities, businesses, and the media to raise awareness about modern slavery.

Second, the walk will raise money for anti-trafficking work, focusing primarily on efforts to fight child trafficking. 75% will go to Stop Child Trafficking Now, an organization that works to address the demand side of child trafficking, promoting efforts to investigate the buyers/predators who patronize child victims of sex trafficking. 15% will go to Courtney's House, a safe-house in DC for child victims of sex trafficking, and 10% will go to DC Stop Modern Slavery.

Organizers expect that between 400-600 walkers will attend the inaugural walk, and they hope it will become an annual event that brings together the anti-slavery movement in DC and celebrates its work and accomplishments.

Lian says that he is excited that the walk will unite DC's anti-slavery movement. As he points out, many different organizations in DC are tackling various aspects of human trafficking, each with its own strengths and strategies; however, in the past these organizations seldom worked together. According to Lian, one goal of Stop Modern Slavery is to make DC slave free by bringing together these organizations to collaborate. The September walk will help establish a culture of collaboration amongst community members, NGO's, public sector, and private sector. According to Lian, "This walk represents the culmination of this strategy and effort. As a large and diverse grassroots organization, we are finally reaching a point where we have the attention of the various anti-slavery organization."

The walk has been organized entirely by part-time community volunteers, which has been a massive undertaking. Lian notes that this strategy has worked, though, because they have emphasized collaboration and have worked to leverage people's strengths and talents. Lian states, "We ascribe to Ghandi's belief that before you can change the world you must change yourself. So before we could ask the anti-slavery movement to work together, we had to first learn to work together ourselves. We are doing this today and I am proud to be part of this effort." And as Lian also notes, the money raised will help end child trafficking by putting child predators in prison and providing services to child victims of sex trafficking.

People can get involved in a number of ways:

1. WALK - Visit the walk's website to sign-up.
2. PROMOTE - Help spread the word about the walk and recruit people to walk. Flyers can be found on the walk's website.
3. VOLUNTEER - Before the walk, volunteers can help with promotion, planning, organizing logistics, contacting celebrities and luminaries, and asking businesses for donations. During the event, they need help setting up, registering people, leading walkers, and cleaning up. To volunteer, email walk@stopmodernslavery.org.
4. DONATE - This walk is made possible entirely through the commitment of volunteers and the generosity of donors. To donate to the walk, please visit the walk's site and click 'Donate' on the left hand menu.

When: Saturday, September 26, 2009. Registration opens at 9:00am, walk beings at 10:00am.

Where: Meridian Hill Park, 15th St. NW and Euclid St NW, Washington DC.

"The Road of Lost Innocence"

"In 1986, when I was sold to a brothel as a prostitute, I was about sixteen years old. Today there are many far younger prostitutes in Cambodia. There are virgins for sale in every large town, and to ensure their virginity, the girls are sometimes as young as five or six," writes Somaly Mam on the dedication page for her book The Road of Lost Innocence: The True Story of a Cambodian Heroine. In the book, originally published in French in 2005, Mam recounts her experiences as a sex trafficking victim, survivor, and eventually as a rescuer for others in the same situation.

Mam was born in 1970 or 1971 during a time of great upheaval in Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge political party came into power and ruled from 1975-1979; due to executions, starvation, and forced labor, 2 million Cambodians died during this time. As Mam notes, this time of incredible hardship and violence shaped and continues to shape life in Cambodia. People are especially vulnerable to exploitation, and Mam suggests that there is a legacy of extreme violence, particularly towards women and girls. Throughout the book, Mam contextualizes her experiences and the sex-trade in general in the larger socio-political context of Cambodia.

Mam was left as an orphan when she was a young girl. After living on her own and scrambling for food and shelter, a man calling himself her grandfather took her to a city, where he abused her and sold her out as a domestic slave. Eventually he sold her to a brothel as a sex slave. After experiencing years of abuse, she gained her freedom after the death of her "grandfather." Because she lacked job skills, education, and any support network, she stayed in the commercial sex industry until she eventually married a Frenchman who was working on foreign aid projects in Cambodia. Eventually they moved to France for a few years, where Mam gained work experience and learned French.

Upon her return to Cambodia, she started working on behalf of other girls and young women who were forced into commercial sex work, either by their parents who sold them to pay a debt or because they were kidnapped from their families for use as sex slaves. At first she mainly provided condoms and other services to the girls and women. Later, she started working to rescue them from the situations, and she opened a shelter. Eventually, Mam opened several shelters, ranging from emergency shelters to more permanent educational facilities for survivors.

In the book, Mam details the many challenges she has faced in her work, particularly relating to lack of consistent funding and police corruption. Despite these many difficulties, Mam's work has helped countless girls and women, many who had no other chance of getting out of their situations. Mam has received numerous honors for her heroic efforts, including being named one of the 100 Most Influential People by Time Magazine in 2009, which the Human Trafficking Project reported on earlier this year.

During her childhood and young-adult years, Mam endured horrific physical and sexual violence, which she graphically describes in the book. Mam notes, however, that the situation in Cambodia has only worsened. According to Mam "the brothels have grown larger and more violent. We find women chained to sewers. Girls come to us beaten half to death. They are so young. Increasingly we see that the meebons have addicted them to drugs so they won't even try to escape. When I was young we were terrorized with snakes and heavy fists, but these girls suffer a more brutal sort of torture. They have marks that are worse than anything I have ever endured" (166).

Looking back on her work, Mam writes, "I don't feel like I can change the world. I don't even try. I only want to change this small life that I see standing in front of me, which is suffering. I want to change this small real thing that is the destiny of one little girl. And then another, and another, because if I didn't, I wouldn't be able to live with myself or sleep at night" (129). Mam's words are especially powerful in light of the prevalence of sex trafficking in Cambodia. The Future Group, a Canadian NGO, reported in 2005 that at least 1 in 40 girls born in Cambodia will be sold into sex slavery.

Throughout the book, Mam emphasizes the need for people to get involved to work to end modern-day slavery. The Somaly Mam Foundation website lists a number of ways to support her work in Cambodia, including volunteering, interning, volunteering in Cambodia, donating, selling bracelets made by survivors, and hosting an awareness fundraiser. While the entire book is a pressing call to action, one passage in particular highlights the urgency of anti-trafficking work: "It's still happening, today, tonight. Imagine how many girls have been raped and hit since you started to read this book. My story doesn't matter, except that it stands for their story too, and their stories are why I don't sleep at night. They haunt me" (61).

Interview: Charles Lee, Co-Founder of the Freeze Project

I recently had the opportunity to speak with Charles Lee, co-founder of the Freeze Project, about the project, its aims, and his views on anti-trafficking activism.

What is the Freeze Project?
According to the Freeze Project website, a typical Freeze event looks something like this:

• Participants will be asked to show up a designated time and place.
• Participants will then proceed to the “Freeze” space and blend themselves into a crowd as if they were regulars in that particular environments (e.g., malls, events, outdoor shopping areas, etc.).
• A cue will be given by the director of the Freeze moment.
• Participants will then stop what they were doing and stay frozen for the next 5 minutes until they receive another cue telling them that the freeze is over.
• Following the freeze, participants will handout a couple of print material each to people observing them (with or without conversation).

Freeze events have taken place at seven locations in the last year. Lee says that right now people are taking the basic idea, running with it, and making it their own. For many different organizations, the Freeze Project model provides a tool that can be adopted and then adapted all over. The model provides flexibility, allowing organizations to combine a Freeze with other events or activities, or to reshape the Freeze concept to meet their groups’ individual needs.



How did it start?
Inspired by the Improv Everywhere group of NY, the Freeze Project began as a creative way to raise awareness and mobilize action. According to Lee, the heart of the Project is bringing awareness to social issues, such as human trafficking. Rather than activism efforts that can be intrusive or confrontational, Lee suggests that there is a need for awareness raising events that are more accessible and less alienating.

Why is this movement important?
Originally begun as a social experiment, Lee says that the Freeze project is an easy entry point to pull people in. While it may seem like the main goal of the event is to raise awareness in the spectators, as Lee pointed out to me, the events are especially powerful for participants. After being involved in a Freeze, there is a good chance that participants will never forget the issue of slavery. And from there, Lee says, people are almost compelled to get involved and take further action.

Lee notes that it is easy for people to have compassion from a distance; in the age of Facebook and other similar sites, it’s easy to connect to a cause on a superficial level. For Lee, one of the advantages of the Freeze Project is that it gets people to physically do something, and partially because the events are so memorable, they can be the first step for people to go deeper on the issues- Lee doesn’t want people’s anti-trafficking work to end with participating in a Freeze.

How did you first learn about trafficking?
Lee began studying human trafficking about six years ago after learning about it from friends. Like many involved in the anti-trafficking movement, Lee found that once he learned about modern day slavery, he had to take action.

Lee co-founded Just 4 One, an organization that focuses on human trafficking, poverty, and orphans. The organization’s human trafficking work ranges from awareness raising campaigns to opening shelters for survivors. Lee’s work focuses on building networks between those who are just learning about slavery and want to do something and those on the front lines. His goal is to connect people to grounded, practical ideas and initiatives that they can engage in.

How can people get involved in the anti-trafficking movement?
Lee’s passion for this work came through clearly when I asked him what people can do to support the Freeze Project and anti-trafficking work in general. His first response was that people need to read up on slavery and learn about human trafficking today. Though it might seem basic, from that knowledge people gain creativity on how to fight the issue. Lee also encourages people to keep modern slavery in the forefront of people’s minds. On a deeper level, Lee points out that the movement to end slavery needs people from all different professions: from lawyers to writers to social workers to business people to actors to graphic designers who will make fighting slavery their career. Lee also mentioned the need for better prosecutors to convict traffickers, legislators to work on policy, service providers for survivors and people to work on prevention.

Ultimately, the Freeze Project serves as a first step towards creatively engaging a diverse audience to join the fight against slavery.

Visit the Freeze Project website

Faceless International

In light of economic crisis and the growing epidemic of selfishness in our country, there are a increasing number of people who are trying to make changes in the world we live in.

Now, I may be biased because I have had the pleasure of working alongside and creating a relationship with these people. Aside from that, I completely respect anyone who desires to create change in our community.

Faceless International is a non-profit organization that began with friends reflecting on a trip to Haiti and sparked a fire that is has yet to burn as brightly as it could. The momentum in growing and the amount of change that this organization could create is going to be admirable and monumental.

The heartbeat of this organization is Stephen Christian (of Anberlin) and Sarah Freeman. Together with many others, they have begun educating young people around the world on issues that effect us today. Be it fair trade, issues of people without homes, or human trafficking; they inspire folks across the country to make change happen in their own backyards and all over the world. Also given the amount of exposure they get with Anberlin, (and other bands like The Classic Crime & Showbread) there are endless amounts of people who will learn about relevant issues. Especially reaching those that wouldn’t otherwise hear about these issues. They can also gain the enthusiasm of people that they admire for issues they care about most.

Within a generation that wants to create change, Faceless goes about it the right way. They form community among its volunteers and within the place they serve.

Whether it’s doing laundry for low-income families in Los Angeles, singing and dancing with the Dahlit in India, forming relationships with coffee farmers in Guatemala; Faceless brings about stories and faces to incredible issues. They inspire the people who pay to spend their time and efforts to take all they learn home. They inspire people to form relationships and community with people all around the world.

Recently I went with Faceless to Los Angeles for my spring break from graduate school (I also went with them to India in December). Eight other students from different locations all came together for different causes; to learn, to serve and to grow. Leaving LA, we had become best friends and family. We know each other’s stories, passions and struggles. We helped each other through tough moments, awkward situations and when coming face to face with an injustice we want to fight. Not only that, we learned stories of youth who have been living on Venice Beach for years. We saw hope for trafficking victims to become survivors. Faceless builds unity to bring community to the people around us and it’s beautiful.

Check out www.facelessinternational.com, or email, ask questions and get involved. Be the change you want to see, make a difference. Be a light to a city that doesn’t have enough.