The Safe Futures Hub has launched a new suite of Practice-based Knowledge (PbK) resources designed to support practitioners in preventing and responding to childhood sexual violence. The resources – a Background Paper and a Guidance Framework – offer a clear, practical foundation for understanding PbK, which draws on the insights that practitioners and people with lived expertise develop through their daily work and experiences. Together, they demonstrate the value of PbK, provide practical guidance for identifying it and using it ethically, and show how frontline expertise can drive stronger programmes, services, and policy.

The Background Paper outlines what PbK is, how it contributes to more effective response and prevention approaches, and how it can complement traditional research evidence. It also includes real-world examples from diverse regions and contexts, including:

• PbK shaping culturally grounded prevention in under-researched settings: In Zanzibar, PbK from three frontline organisations – C-Sema, Pathfinder, and ActionAid – shaped a locally relevant childhood sexual violence prevention toolkit, enabling religious and administrative leaders to break long-held silences and support community-led safety actions.
• Deaf-led PbK shaping new prevention tools: PbK from deaf leaders of DeafKidz International, practitioners, and communities highlighted the barriers that leave deaf children unprotected, informing a game-based prevention tool that centres deaf children’s realities.
• PbK revealing why adults hesitate to act: Long-term experience from Hidden Water, a global organisation working with survivors and people who have caused harm, revealed common reasons why adults may hesitate to protect a child. This PbK informed the Safe(r) Adults programme, which helps adults practise protective skills and address emotional barriers to intervention.

The second resource in the suite, the Guidance Framework, provides practical guidance on how to use PbK. It offers tools, reflection prompts, and structured steps to support practitioners in identifying the knowledge emerging from their daily work and using it ethically to improve practice.

“Every day, practitioners witness what keeps children safe – and what doesn’t – long before this learning reaches formal spaces,” said Arti Mohan, lead technical specialist, Practice-based Knowledge at Safe Futures Hub. “This suite of resources helps us recognise that knowledge, learn from it, and bring it together with research and data to strengthen prevention and response.”

Rooted in an 18-month-long, global consultative process, the suite of resources draws on the expertise of more than 100 practitioners, researchers, and individuals with lived experience.

“Practice-based knowledge reminds us that the most meaningful insights often come from those closest to the work,” said Nicolas Makharashvili, director of Safe Futures Hub. “With this Framework, we’re acknowledging that lived experience, practitioner wisdom, and community leadership are indispensable to preventing child sexual violence. When we bring these forms of knowledge into dialogue with research and data, we build approaches that are more relevant, more inclusive, and ultimately more effective.”

PbK offers early insight into what practitioners and people with lived expertise are learning in real-time, but it must be shared and interpreted with care. Because it is context-specific and often unevaluated, PbK is not designed to support practice replication or scaling. Instead, its strength lies in the questions it raises and the innovations it can inspire. When considered alongside evidence, research, and data, PbK helps practitioners refine interventions, test assumptions, and ground decisions in lived realities.

“Neither research nor practice on its own can get us where we need to go,” said Liz Dartnall, executive director of the Sexual Violence Research Initiative. “Practice-based knowledge gives us insights from the field, and research helps refine and deepen that learning. This framework brings both perspectives together to build interventions shaped by evidence and real-world experience.”

“Too often, the voices and experiences of those working closest to those affected by childhood sexual violence are left out of the knowledge base that drives policy and funding,” said Dr. Daniela Ligiero, president and CEO of Together for Girls. “The Practice-based Knowledge Guidance Framework is a game-changer because it honors that experience and expertise. It ensures that what’s learned on the frontlines informs strategies, making them more relevant, inclusive, and effective.”

“The PbK Guidance Framework represents a critical step toward smarter, more adaptive solutions,” said Iain Drennan, executive director of WeProtect Global Alliance. “In the fight to end childhood sexual violence, our response systems must evolve as quickly as the threats do. Gathering and sharing real-time learning from practitioners gives us the agility we need to protect children more effectively worldwide.”

The PbK Guidance Framework paves the way for ensuring that the vital PbK from the frontlines is intentionally gathered, shared and integrated into the global knowledge base so that prevention and response becomes more relevant and effective.

About the Safe Futures Hub
Safe Futures Hub is a joint initiative of Together for Girls, WeProtect Global Alliance, and the Sexual Violence Research Initiative (SVRI) focused on solutions informed by data, evidence, practitioner knowledge, and community-led approaches to ending sexual violence against children. We work in partnership, understanding the urgent need for more collaboration, innovation, and diversity in order to combat this complex and horrific issue. Together, we know we can create a safer future for all children. Learn more by visiting safefutureshub.org.

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