Our Historic Work with TDSB
Since 2022, Aura Freedom has partnered with the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) to strengthen the capacity of school communities to prevent child sexual exploitation and sex trafficking, in response to the Ontario Ministry of Education’s Policy/Program Memorandum 166, which mandated school boards to address sex trafficking.
To support this initiative, Aura Freedom conducted a comprehensive needs assessment with TDSB stakeholders, including educators, administrators, professional support staff, youth counsellors, and students. Drawing on these findings, we developed and delivered a customized three-part training program designed to equip school staff with the knowledge and tools to recognize vulnerability, identify warning signs, and respond using survivor-informed approaches.
Beyond providing staff training, Aura Freedom supported TDSB’s broader prevention strategy by facilitating partnerships with community experts, contributing to the Board’s Anti-Sex Trafficking Collaborative, upon which Aura Freedom also sits. We have continued to provide consultation and support for various school-level initiatives.
To date, over 400 TDSB Professional Support Staff have completed Aura Freedom’s customized anti-sex trafficking training. Since implementing these training modules, TDSB has reported an increase of more than 50% in calls to Professional Support Staff regarding concerns about sex trafficking. This increase reflects strengthened staff capacity and confidence to recognize indicators of exploitation, respond appropriately, and connect students with support before harm escalates.
Recent Efforts to Provide Prevention Education to Youth
Since 2024, Aura Freedom has provided presentations, breakout sessions, and educational resources to several youth-focused Sex Trafficking Summits and Symposiums co-hosted by the Toronto District School Board, Covenant House Toronto and Toronto Police Services – and delivered alongside numerous community partners.
These events have brought together students, educators, and frontline organizations to strengthen awareness, prevention, and coordinated responses to human trafficking and sexual exploitation. Over the course of these engagements, we’ve had the opportunity to provide crucial prevention education to over 1300 students across local schools.
Over these engagements, students participated in sessions exploring topics such as the realities of sex trafficking, grooming and luring, digital safety, pathways to support, and recognizing warning signs of exploitation.
In our most recent engagement, Aura Freedom’s Senior Manager, Danielle Warren, led a session on coercive control, helping students better understand experiences of coercion, common patterns of abusive behaviour, and the impacts these forms of abuse can have on survivors.
After the most recent summit, 99% of students reported learning information and safety tips that would help protect themselves and others from exploitation.
Together, these initiatives demonstrate that investing in prevention education and cross-sector collaboration strengthens the ability of school communities to identify risk, support students, and create safer environments where exploitation is less likely to occur.
