Invisible Children Author

& Speaker Mike Tikkanen

WEBLOG:  www.invisiblechildren.org/weblog

KARA, Kids At Risk Action www.karagroup.org

August 13th for the Youth Assembly at the United Nations New York

 

Successful entrepreneur and author Mike Tikkanen combines his business acumen with his passion for neglected and abused children to offer answers to some of our communities most serious and complex problems.

Since 1996, he’s volunteered in the Guardian ad-Litem program as a court appointed special advocate (CASA). Mike has worked with about fifty "Invisible Children" that have become part of the County Child Protection System. Mike has become passionate about the madness that surrounds the treatment of abused and neglected children.

Learn the key issues facing abused and neglected children, what programs and policies work to improve their lives, and how you can be a better advocate for at risk children.

A public speaker on business for the past twenty years, Mike decided to bring public attention to what goes on behind closed doors and in the dark corners of our communities.  Mike recently held a workshop at the United Nations in New York, and has spoken at many conferences (Social Workers, Women's Prison Wardens, Educators) and hundreds of business, community, and religious organizations.

Once you’ve heard Mike’s message on Invisible Children, you’ll never be the same. If you want a program that gets your audience thinking, you’ll call Mike Tikkanen. He guarantees a message filled with rock solid evidence, emotion, and ideas. Call him for Luncheons, breakouts, and keynotes.

 

AREAS OF EXPERTISE:

 

Social Policy & the Economics of At Risk Children

Justice and Crime

Education

Children’s Rights

Health and Mental Health

Child Protection Systems

 

3 reasons to hire Mike Tikkanen:

Mike Tikkanen presents a clear and impassioned message on one of the most misrepresented and under-reported issues facing America today. First, he raises the audience’s awareness of how society fails its children, then he offers tools audience members can use to help make a difference.

Tikkanen’s content works perfectly for groups with a social conscience, involved in social or education work, or wanting a program leaving the audience with ideas for improving the lives of at risk children.

Tikkanen’s passion for the children who will become the next generation’s teen parents or adolescent felons brings life and hope to a topic often ignored—how our institutions fail to achieve what they were created to accomplish.

Kids At Risk Action www.karagroup.org

 

Mike Tikkanen’s Most Requested

Program Titles:

The Impact of Abuse & Abandonment

(on Children & Communities)

Why Some Kids Don’t Learn in School

(and what it's like to teach them)

Punishing Abused Children

Psychotropic Drugs For Children

Ending Violence Against Children

A Local, National, and International

Economic Perspective

and the costs of solving 

(or not solving) the problem

 

 

 

Testimonials:

 

"Mike clearly explains what needs to change.  When you hear him speak, you will be asking yourself; What can I do to help?"

Shirley Schroeder, Teacher, guardian ad-Litem, Mother, Grandmother

 

"A passionate, informative, and compelling look at the shameful treatment of vulnerable Children, how it impacts society, and what we can do about it. Tikkanen effectively mixes personal experience and real-life stories…"

Burt Burlow, President Growing Communities For Peace

"It is truly critical for adults from all corners of our society to speak out on behalf of children, especially children without someone who cares about them and their futures…"

Connie Skillingstad, Executive Director Prevent Child Abuse Minnesota

"All children are born into a promise that the adults in their lives would take care of them. Unfortunately, that promise all too often gets broken and the only recourse these children have is a Child Protection System and Juvenile Justice System that certainly could use more help."

Senator (State of MN Mee Moua

"Open your ears to riveting and accurate stories of today’s children. Mike’s eye opening experiences encourage us all to reach out and make life better for troubled children in our communities"

Donald Schmitz, Author and Founder of the Grandkids and Me Foundation

Invisible Children 

The American cycle of abuse and its cost

     About three million children are reported to child protection agencies in America each year.  About one million of those children are placed in protective custody because of severe neglect or abuse.  About 500,000 children are placed into foster care and adoptive placements.  Abused and neglected children are all around us.     

     These children are invisible in our community, yet each one of us is directly responsible for their plight. They live under our laws; they go to our schools; they are convicted by our courts; many of them spend lifetimes in our prisons. They have no say in the laws and policies that rule their lives. Just like they had no say in the neglect and abuse that was their childhood.

     Neglected and abused children make up a great majority of the crime, drugs, and violence we experience in our communities. Over fifty percent of the children in the juvenile justce system have diagnosable mental illness.

    Ninety percent of the juveniles in the Juvenile Justice System have come out of the Child Protection System (Minnesota's Chief Justice, Kathleen Blatz). Over 90 percent of the adults in the Criminal Justice System come out of the Juvenile Justice System. Justice Blatz (and others) call it a prison "feeder" system.

     The United States is the only nation in the world to build prisons based on failed third grade reading scores or the number of children in Child Protection.

  Children are not aware of the rightness or wrongness of their own abuse. They do not know that abuse is abnormal, or even that it is wrong. To a five-year-old, no matter how painful and frightening her life is, her life is normal. A sad and lasting fact of child abuse is that children blame themselves for the abuse they receive.

     How can sex, drugs, and violence be unlearned by a ten year old child whose entire life has been just that? It takes years of therapy to change a child’s perception of an abusive past. It takes a great deal longer for an abused child to develop a healthy view of the world and a positive self-image.

     There is no book a child can go to, or code they are born with, that explains the abnormality of what is happening to them. Children can’t call their senators, or complain to the authorities (they can’t even tell their parents).

     Behaviors learned by abused children to stay alive in toxic homes are terribly counter-productive once the child is out of the abusive circumstances and trying to live a normal life. The behaviors developed for staying alive and avoiding pain dominate and thus can become significant detriments to getting along in society. As a matter of fact, for many troubled youth, their explosive responses and pain avoidance behaviors define them as uneducated social misfits with criminal histories. 

     There must be a better way to deal with abused and abandoned children in our communities.  Let's work together to raise awareness and solve this problem.  Read the book, form your own opinions, tell your friends and neighbors what you know and let policy makers know that you are a concerned citizen.