AnnJanette Alejano-Steele, Ph. D.
Research Director, The Colorado Project
LCHT Co-Founder and Board Chairperson
Laboratory to Combat Human Trafficking

It started with a question: “What will it take to end human trafficking?”

At the time we were asked this question, we had five years of experience under our belts as a Denver-based anti-trafficking organization. We spent our formative years reacting to needs in our community; working collaboratively to best understand what human trafficking looked like in our part of the country. Over the years, we spent considerable time critically thinking about the complexity of the crime in the formal classroom, in conference spaces and on the ground. It wasn’t until Gayle Embrey posed the question to us at our 2009 Health Care Train-the-Trainer conference that we began to ponder the comprehensive nature of this question.

We started to think about the community we knew best--Denver--and thought about the breadth of our work in Colorado. What would it take to end human trafficking in Colorado? What would it take to answer this question? And how can we do it comprehensively given the complexities of the crime?

So, what will it take to end human trafficking?

It begins with finding out what is working well nationally and testing our findings in Colorado.

The Colorado Project to Comprehensively Combat Human Trafficking (Colorado Project) is a collaborative initiative that aims to develop sustainable efforts to end human trafficking with the essential input of those working on the ground. At a state level, the Colorado Project will develop a tool by which communities can assess their strengths and gaps in combating human trafficking. It’s a project that will honor local communities, document promising practices and inform anti-human trafficking efforts, both in Colorado and in other states.

As Research Director for this project, I invite you to learn alongside us through our newly-launched Colorado Project website, dedicated specifically to keeping you informed about the project. On the website, you can take time to learn about the project’s intentions, design and methodology. Feel free to proudly connect with your inner nerd to understand the importance of research in the anti-trafficking field. Join our creative collaborative space. Perhaps you will have connections and resources that will help along the way. Are you game?

So often in academe, the public is not privy to the research process as it happens. More often than not, we read sound bites in the public media that briefly oversimplify outcomes, neatly packaged for public consumption. With the help of the Colorado Project blogs you’ll find here, our Project Team hopes to share our process, our tools and our insights as we go along. Over time, you’ll learn about the disciplinary composition of our Project Team, our Advisory Board and the process of how we’ll gather information both nationally and locally.

For years, the Laboratory to Combat Human Trafficking has built its foundation as a grassroots organization, fully grounded in community needs and community voice, privileged with access to scholarly tools and spaces.

Because of our multidisciplinary lenses, we’ve had incredible discussions and debates, providing spaces for critical thinking and navigating the “space in between” multiple sectors. We hope that this blog will help to hold shared space open to inquiry.

Inspired by a piece in GOOD Magazine’s Winter 2010 “The Work Issue,” I spent considerable time questioning how to motivate the team to keep us going. As Research Director (and at the risk of sounding overly self-assured), I can say that we’ll aim to do the best we can with the tools we have today. I recognize that the tools may change next year, next month, in the next hour. And in this spirit, I share these thoughts as part of our invitation to you to get involved.

It’s going to be a good year.