Column: Invest in education and other services to end sex trafficking

Education ends exploitation.

While there is no silver bullet to slay Hawaii’s monstrous sex industry, providing a coordinated continuum of care that students can access on campus, coupled with lessons about building safe communities and maintaining healthy relationships, would be a good step in stopping our islands’ slave trade.

In a recent report, Arizona State University researchers released a study that exposes the dark side of paradise. According to their report, one in every 11 adult males living in our state buys sex online. When visitors are also counted, that number worsens to one in every seven men walking the streets of our island home.

ASU’s findings are grim, but not surprising to local organizations that provide services to survivors of sex trafficking. IMUAlliance, for example, has trained volunteers to perform outreach to victims in high-risk locations, like strip clubs, massage parlors and hostess bars.

Our team regularly responds to horrific abuse. We’ve worked with young women who’ve been beaten repeatedly, burned with cigarettes, and, in some extreme cases, even forgotten their own names. Often, the victims we encounter aren’t old enough to drive a car.

To halt human trafficking on our shores, we must disrupt the financial demand for exploitation. Trafficking follows the same principles as any other commercial operation. When profits disappear, so does the industry.

Thus, policymakers should pursue anti-trafficking legislation that dramatically increases criminal penalties for sex buyers, while eliminating penalties for so-called “prostitutes,” who are frequently being forced into the sex trade through violence and threats. Victims deserve justice, not jail cells.

More fundamentally, legislators should invest in education programs that deliver wrap-around care for students. Just as a quality education increases employ- ment opportunities and civic engagement, so, too, does it elevate the chances of avoiding abuse.

Traffickers prey upon vulnerability. Students’ weaknesses come in many forms, from an unstable home life to peer pressure to academic stress. To deal with these problems, our state could create a community schools program that consolidates services, like health care and family support initiatives, on school campuses.

In prioritizing student wellness, community schools have been shown to increase learning growth and graduation rates, while decreasing behavioral referrals and chronic absenteeism. In New York City, for example, community schools that highlight mental health counseling and consistent family outreach have seen chronic absenteeism rates fall by 7.8 percent as of 2017, with graduation rates rising 4.8 percent.

Engaged learners are less likely to become targets for pimps. Additionally, since even the most affluent and well-adjusted children face challenges in their maturation processes, guaranteeing that schools have the resources to respond to trauma with compassion and sensitivity may make the difference between sending a student to college or losing them to the sex trade.

Likewise, community schools can partner with service providers to run modern sexual health programs that model positive relationships and tackle tough issues, like sexual consent. These programs don’t just prevent young women from becoming victims of gender violence, they also teach young men about healthy forms of masculinity that aren’t predicated on dominance and physical aggression.

Launching community schools will require additional money — yet, they have much capacity to address a wide range of student needs and help remedy longstanding social problems, like sexual exploitation.

It’s unfortunate that voters now won’t be able to vote on the constitutional amendment, which aimed to improve education funding. Supporters, though, must keep fighting to increase revenue for our schools. The security of our keiki’s future depends on it.

Kris Coffield is executive director of IMUAlliance and chairs the Democratic Party of Hawaii’s education caucus.