Faith in Action

To be eligible for the Circle of Honor Award, State councils must be fully compliant with safe environment requirements.  This means that the State deputy and state advocate must complete the Praesidium safe environment training.  Additionally, the state program director, the state youth director (if any), the state family director, the state community director, and the state squire chairman (if any) must complete both the training and a background check.

To be eligible for Star Council, councils must be fully compliant with safe environment requirements.  This means that the Grand Knight and program director must complete the safe environment training.  Additionally, the council family director and community director must complete both training and consent to a background check.  Leaving one or more of the Program Director, Family Director, and/or Community Director roles vacant disqualifies a council from Star Council eligibility.  If the council sponsors a Columbian Squire Circle, all circle counselors must complete the training and background checks.

Regarding youth activities, there should never be fewer than two fully trained members in attendance for a youth activity event.

1)  The Grand Knight who is trained should attend the activity.

2)  The Family Director or Community Director who has been trained and background checked along with the Grand Knight should attend the activity.

3) If the Family Director and the Community Director are both unable to attend the youth activity, any other member who has been recently trained and background checked must be in attendance.

4)  If there are no available background checked or trained members of the councils to attend the youth activity, then, every effort should be made to have a qualified Family Director or Community Director from a nearby council attend the youth activity. 

5)  If there are no such qualified members, then the State Youth Director, State Family Director, and/or State Community Director should attend the youth activity.

6)  Last but not least, if at least two qualified members are not available to attend the activity, then the activity must be re-scheduled to a time when the council’s Family Director and/or Community Director, along with another qualified member will be able to attend for the full duration of the event.

Finally, within Praesidium Armatus, we only track those that hold officer mandated roles for Safe Environment.  We have had members who hold officer mandated roles for Safe Environment take the training in Self-enrollment. You will also notice that on the top of the certificate it indicates “Knights of Columbus – Voluntary Self Enrollment”, this means that he does not hold an officer role for Safe Environment and he willingly took the training on his own under self-registration and the training taken was for his own knowledge. For those individuals, as long as they are able to produce a certificate of completion, we will give them credit for completing the Safe Environment training when they are appointed to that officer mandated role.  This is why it’s recommended to wait for the e-mail invitation.

I have noticed many Form 365’s, (and 185’s) for that matter, being submitted without any e-mail addresses.  As the safe environment program is almost exclusively on-line, those individuals won’t have the opportunity to become compliant.

~State Advocate Michael Giroux

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