Blog Summary:
1. The Collins Center supports individuals and families affected by sexual harm through crisis support, advocacy, counseling, and prevention education.
2. The organization provides a 24-hour crisis hotline and advocate support for people navigating medical, legal, and justice systems.
3. Its nationally accredited Child Advocacy Center offers a safe, child-friendly space for forensic interviews, family advocacy, and trauma-focused therapy.
4. The Collins Center uses Healthy Relationships Project materials from Prevent Child Abuse Vermont to teach children about boundaries, consent, digital safety, and healthy relationships.
5. The agency’s work is rooted in helping people feel listened to, supported, and respected while strengthening community prevention efforts.
Reading Time: (5 Minutes)
For more than 30 years, the Collins Center has been helping individuals and families feel supported during some of the most difficult moments of their lives.
Based in Harrisonburg, Virginia, the Collins Center is a sexual assault response and advocacy organization serving the City of Harrisonburg, Rockingham and Page Counties, and surrounding communities. Its work includes crisis support, advocacy, trauma-informed counseling, child advocacy, education, and prevention.
Although each service may look different, they are all connected by one goal: helping people affected by sexual harm feel heard, supported, and less alone.
A History Rooted in Community Action
The Collins Center’s story began after the death of community member Shirley Collins in 1987. Members of the community came together because they recognized the need for a stronger and more coordinated response to sexual violence.
In 1989, the organization began serving the community as Citizens Against Sexual Assault. It later became the Collins Center in honour of Shirley Collins and to reflect the organization’s growing services, including therapy, prevention programming, and support for children and families.
Today, its mission is to promote healing through compassionate and collaborative services for everyone affected by sexual harm.
Being There When Someone Needs Support
Reaching out after experiencing sexual harm can be difficult. A person may not know what to do next, who to contact, or whether they are ready to make a report.
The Collins Center provides a 24-hour crisis hotline where individuals can speak with someone who is prepared to listen and offer support. Its advocates can also help people understand their options, connect with resources, and navigate medical, legal, and justice systems.
When requested, an advocate can accompany someone to the hospital or when speaking with law enforcement. The organization also offers crisis support sessions with trained counselors and advocates.
These services are free, helping ensure that cost does not prevent someone from receiving support.
Counseling That Respects Each Person’s Experience
Healing does not follow one timeline, and people may seek help immediately after an experience or many years later.
The Collins Center offers trauma-informed counseling to survivors and others affected by sexual harm. Rather than telling people what they should do, this approach centres their choices, experiences, and individual needs.
This respect for survivors’ decisions can make a meaningful difference. Support is not only about providing information. It is also about helping someone regain a sense of control and reminding them that they do not have to navigate everything alone.
Creating a Safer Place for Children and Families
The Collins Center is also home to a nationally accredited Child Advocacy Center.
The Child Advocacy Center provides a safe, neutral, and child-friendly environment where children can speak with specially trained professionals about possible experiences of abuse. The center offers forensic interviews, family advocacy, and trauma-focused therapy for children.
It also coordinates professionals from law enforcement, social services, mental health services, schools, and the Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office. Bringing these professionals together can reduce the number of times a child is asked to repeat their experience and helps families receive a more coordinated response.
The center’s advocates also support non-offending caregivers by explaining the process, connecting families with resources, and helping them prepare for possible court involvement.
According to the National Children’s Alliance, Children’s Advocacy Centers across the United States served 365,140 children experiencing allegations of abuse in 2025. Behind that number are children and families who deserve a response built around care, patience, and safety.
Education as a Form of Prevention
An important part of the Collins Center’s work happens before someone ever needs crisis support.
Through its education and training programs, the organization helps community members better understand sexual harm, learn how to support survivors, and explore how harm can be prevented.
The Collins Center uses materials from the Healthy Relationships Project of Prevent Child Abuse Vermont to teach healthy boundaries and relationships to children from ages 3 through Grade 12. This includes teaching about bodies, consent, digital safety, and what a healthy relationship looks like.
Through its Safe Church program, the Collins Center works with faith communities to strengthen policies and practices for protecting children. The program also provides training for staff and volunteers, educational resources, and support for adult survivors.
The organization also creates presentations for schools, colleges, youth-serving organizations, professionals, faith communities, civic groups, and grassroots organizations. Topics can include healthy relationships, healthy sexuality, sexual harm, and child sexual abuse prevention.
This educational work matters because safer communities are not created by one organization alone. Prevention requires informed adults, supportive systems, healthy conversations, and people who are prepared to recognize concerns and respond with care.
A Lasting Impact on the Community
Each year, the Collins Center provides direct services to more than 500 people and reaches approximately 3,000 community members through prevention and educational outreach.
Those numbers represent people receiving advocacy, children being supported in safer environments, survivors accessing counseling, and community members gaining knowledge that may help prevent future harm.
When reflecting on the Collins Center’s impact, Associate Director Ross Erb shared that what makes him most proud is the way people feel after interacting with the agency’s staff. Whether someone is receiving support during forensic nurse examiner services at a medical facility, calling the hotline in the middle of the night, attending a forensic interview with their family, or participating in a prevention or education program, Ross emphasized that people feel listened to, supported, and respected.
That sense of care is central to the Collins Center’s work. Each staff member is passionate about supporting victims, survivors, families, and the broader community while helping reduce the harm caused by sexual violence and equipping people to prevent harm before it happens.
Ross also shared his admiration for the strength of the children and adults the Collins Center works with. While no one should have to be resilient in the face of harm, he reflected on how deeply moving it is to witness people handle adversity without allowing it to define or limit their lives.
We are proud to work with the Collins Center and to recognize the thoughtful, compassionate work its staff, volunteers, and community partners continue to provide.
Their work is a reminder that supporting survivors involves more than responding during a crisis. It also means creating spaces where people feel believed, helping families understand complicated systems, educating communities, and working toward a future where sexual harm is prevented.