Contact: Cristina Arana,
(818) 677-2130
carana@exec.csun.edu

CSUN's Valley Trauma Center Seeking Volunteers

Cal State Northridge's Valley Trauma Center is seeking volunteers for its upcoming training this fall. The center provides a 60-hour training program for all volunteers, who are then certified as rape crisis advocates by the California Office of Criminal Justice Planning.

Volunteers staff a 24-hour hotline for survivors of sexual assault, meet with victims at the hospital, police station, or court to provide on-site emotional support and information. Workers may also provide short- and long-term individual counseling for survivors, their families and significant others.

The Valley Trauma Center opened in 1984 as part of CSUN's Department of Educational Psychology and Counseling. According to Patti Dengler, the director of the program, the Valley Trauma Center responded to more than 3,000 hotline calls, provided counseling to 750 clients and made more than 400 assault prevention and education presentations to more than 14,500 people last year.

Anyone over the age of 18 may apply for the upcoming training, which is scheduled to begin in September. Community members interested in volunteering should call, (818) 772-0196 for applications and interviews.