The safety and well-being of all participants remains the utmost priority for everyone at Little League® International and as local leagues and families gear up for the 2025 season, we wanted to share two important updates to the Little League Child Protection Program that will help enhance and simplify the volunteer experience.
DOWNLOAD CHILD PROTECTION PROGRAM
Each year, volunteers at every level of the Little League program are required to complete their background check as well as Abuse Awareness Training in order to be eligible to volunteer. While these requirements have previously been permitted to be completed through third-parties, Little League has worked to streamline those requirements to help make the process itself easier for both the user and administrator tracking their league/district volunteers.
Abuse Awareness Training Through Little League
With the requirement of all volunteers to complete Abuse Awareness training each year, we are proud to announce the launch of the new Little League Abuse Awareness Course, which will now serve as the required course for completion and is available for all volunteers to complete at LittleLeague.org/AbuseAwareness.
This course, which serves as a replacement for the programs previously available through third-party organizations like USA Baseball, is custom to the Little League program and provides an easier learning experience for our volunteers. Required to be completed by all volunteers each year, this course is available as part of the training and education courses at LittleLeague.org/Training, making signing up for the course even easier for our volunteers to both complete and track their volunteer completions.
Once a volunteer completes the course, they will receive an email with their completion certificate as well as be able to access it through the training platform itself. League Officials, who are responsible for ensuring all volunteers complete the course, can also access the completion records through the Little League Data Center.
Background Checks Through JDP
Starting in 2025, background checks for all volunteers are required to be conducted through J.D. Palatine (JDP) and other providers will not be accepted. As a reminder, the use of Sports Connect (required as part of Central Registration) will continue to provide leagues with the advantage of the integrated technologies available to ease this process.
Little League International requires all leagues and districts in the United States to conduct an annual background check, including a nationwide criminal search, a search of the National Sex Offender Registry, and a review of the U.S. Center for SafeSport Centralized Disciplinary Database and Little League International Ineligible List.
JDP has a Criminal File database that contains more than 600 million records, including criminal and sex offender registry records covering 50 states and the District of Columbia, as well as the review of the U.S. Center for SafeSport Centralized Disciplinary Database and Little League International Ineligible List, meeting the current Little League Regulation 1(c) 8 & 9 requirement.
As leagues begin to charter and get ready for the 2025 season, it is important for all volunteers, parents, and guardians to read through the Little League Child Protection Program (LittleLeague.org/ChildProtectionProgram) and understand the requirements for a local league to remain affiliated with Little League Baseball and Softball.