During Free the Slaves’ 2024 Remote Working Tour to Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean, our team met with Dr. Debra Joseph, then President of Soroptimist International Barbados, a clinical social worker, and a Social Work lecturer at the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill campus. In that conversation, Dr. Joseph highlighted an opportunity that would become central to our Caribbean strategy: partnering with social workers to strengthen grassroots responses to human trafficking. Social workers are deeply embedded in communities, working in schools, social services, and frontline support systems. As Dr. Joseph noted, this position makes them uniquely equipped to identify risk, respond early, and support survivors with dignity. She also committed to facilitating an introduction to the President of the Barbados Association of Professional Social Workers (BAPSW), helping open the door to regional collaboration. Her insight affirmed work Free the Slaves had already begun the previous year. In February 2023, two staff members from the Student Support Services Division (SSSD) of Trinidad and Tobago’s Ministry of Education attended the Freedom from Slavery Caribbean Regional Forum in Port of Spain. That initial connection laid the groundwork for deeper engagement with school-based social workers and guidance officers across the region.
Building Capacity in Trinidad and Tobago
Throughout the remainder of 2024, Free the Slaves re-engaged with the SSSD and delivered two three-day, in-person workshops using Module 1 of our Community Liberation Initiative (CLI) Toolkit. These trainings were held in September and October for guidance officers and school social workers from the Port of Spain Education District, resulting in 80 graduates. In early 2025, we received requests to expand this training to school social workers in two education districts in south Trinidad. In response, we combined the groups and delivered another three-day CLI Module 1 workshop in February 2025, reaching 55 additional participants. These sessions focused on strengthening participants’ ability to identify trafficking, respond appropriately, and connect individuals to protection pathways, embedding anti-trafficking capacity within existing education and child protection systems.
Expanding Regional Engagement: Barbados and Jamaica
Our engagement with social workers in Barbados and Jamaica formally began in August 2024. Free the Slaves delivered introductory presentations to the leadership of BAPSW and the Jamaica Association of Social Workers (JASW) to explore interest in CLI training. These conversations were followed by in-country visits to Jamaica in January 2025 and Barbados in March 2025, where we met directly with social workers. From March to May 2025, Free the Slaves conducted a virtual CLI Module 1 workshop with members of BAPSW, graduating 15 participants. Following BAPSW’s Annual General Meeting in June and a pause during July and August, we marked their successful completion with a virtual graduation ceremony in September 2025. In July 2025, Free the Slaves partnered with JASW and a social work lecturer from the University of the Commonwealth Caribbean to train 35 social workers and social work students from across Jamaica. Their completion of the virtual CLI Module 1 workshop was celebrated during a virtual graduation ceremony in September 2025, featuring a keynote address by Dr. Warren Thompson, a social worker and Director of Intake, Investigation, Adoption, and Court Services at Jamaica’s Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA).
Centering Survivor-Informed Practice
As requests for training continued from Jamaica and the Eastern Caribbean, Free the Slaves launched another round of CLI training in late September 2025 for social workers and other helping professionals. For each new cohort, we invited Ms. Shamere McKenzie, Founder of the Caribbean Survivor Network, to deliver a session on identifying survivors and understanding trauma. Integrating survivor leadership into these trainings strengthens practitioners’ ability to respond with empathy, care, and respect, ensuring that identification and intervention prioritize safety, choice, and dignity.
Looking Ahead: Strengthening Systems Through Social Work
Free the Slaves’ investment in social workers across the Caribbean reflects a strategic commitment to strengthening the systems that protect communities and prevent exploitation. When social workers are equipped with practical tools, supported through collaboration, and empowered to act, trafficking becomes harder to hide. By embedding anti-trafficking capacity within education systems, professional associations, and survivor-informed networks, this work helps ensure that survivors are better served, communities are better protected, and responses to exploitation are grounded in rights-centered care.
