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Family Support 360 Grantee Abstracts
Implementation Grantees are those grantees who received a grant from ADD in FY 2003 to plan a Family Support One-Stop Center in their State, and are now implementing their plan by opening the center to serve at least 50 families of those with developmental disabilities.
Implementation Grantees
Alaska Top
Stone
Soup Group
Mission and Goals
To provide a one-stop resource center for families living
in the Mt. View community in Anchorage. Services provided
include family-centered support planning, information, referral
services, and community outreach.
Accomplishments
Our community outreach and continuing support of other
agencies working with families.
Our wrap-around services approach.
The rapport we have built with families and community.
Positive Impact
Working with a family to get connected with services
for their 4-year-old who has a developmental disability. Assisting
the parent in getting support for her own disabilities and
literacy concerns. We were able to get the family connected
and set up with DSDS services, SSI, Anchorage Literacy Project,
and Medical home.
Colorado Top
JFK
Partners, University of Colorado Health Sciences Center
Mission and Goals
Colorado Family Support 360 is working on developing a
comprehensive family support service delivery model that helps
families who receive TANF and have a child with a developmental
disability become self-sufficient, empowered, and aware of
services that will assist them in meeting family needs.
Major Goals:
1. Colorado Family Support 360 will carry out a process of
piloting, refining, and fully implementing a comprehensive
family support model.
2. Create a process for replication and dissemination of the
model to no less than six counties in the State.
Accomplishments
1. Project 360 advocated for and created a policy that
allows targeted families to be excused from participating
in work-related activities while their identified barriers
could be addressed by the Family Support Coordinators without
being sanctioned. DHS–TANF has agreed to implement such a
policy and has adopted the form created by the project.
2. Project 360 has developed a process to provide consultations
to TANF Program Case Managers when they encounter a family
who has a child with a developmental disability where it is
deemed that Project 360’s intervention would be beneficial.
These families usually represent ongoing TANF cases. Resource
and support information is provided to the TANF Program Case
Manager based on the families’ needs.
3. Project 360, in collaboration with its MOU partner, the
Mayor’s Office of Economic Development-Division of Workforce
Development (DWD), has teamed up to organize and deliver monthly
disability-focused trainings to both TANF and DWD personnel.
Positive Impact
See Colorado Family Support 360 Case Study on the ADD
Family Support 360 Website,
http://www.addfamilysupport360.org, under the Private
Resource Library.
Commonwealth of the Northern
Marianna Islands Top
CNMI
Council on Developmental Disabilities
Mission and Goals
To serve and support family members to advocate for there
children with disabilities in the CNMI from birth to 21 years.
Collaborate with service providers to gather information and
resources for parents in a one-stop center.
To help create better lives for people with disabilities and
their families.
Accomplishments
We were able reach and serve more families than anticipated
or required.
We were able to affect the delivery of services with some
service providers.
Positive Impact
A parent with an autistic 7-year-old daughter claimed
that since his daughter was diagnosed with autism, he visited
service providers including the Medicaid/Medicare office but
was consistently turned away. With the assistance and support
of the FHC, his daughter was able to be placed to receive
three services.
District of Columbia Top
Quality
Trust for Individuals With Disabilities
Mission and Goals
To ensure access to family-centered serves and supports
that enable families to exercise choice and control and to
achieve full participation in community life.
Accomplishments
DCFEC secured liaisons within government agencies supporting
families who have a child or other member with a developmental
disability.
DCFEC increased families’ abilities to self-advocate.
DCFEC sponsored training opportunities for families.
Positive Impact
With staff support, an individual with developmental disabilities
(teen mother of three) has improved in the areas of self-help,
self-advocacy, and parenting skills. Marked increases of self-directed
efforts have occurred within the past 6 months.
Hawaii Top
Real
Choices Hawaii
Mission and Goals
The project is creating a Navigational One-Stop System
for agencies and families of Hawaii. All participating agencies
will meet the criteria for competency certification. The project
will serve 50 families each year who have a family member
age 14–21 with a developmental disability.
Accomplishments
The project has brought together over 10 community agencies
and programs to participate in the Navigational One-Stop.
These agencies are collaborating on the creation of competency
criteria. The project has provided over 200 services to community
and family members on the Windward side of Oahu.
Positive Impact
One family had three generations living together. There
was a student with a disability in the family. Through involvement
with the project the student was able to begin working and
make progress on a career path, looking forward to a goal
of independent living. The grandmother was connected to community
agencies that provide personal assistants and as a result
the mother was able to develop her own natural supports.
Idaho Top
Idaho
Family Support 360 Project
Mission and Goals
The Idaho Family Support 360 Project has been able to
reach families across the State through better information
resources, knowledgeable and helpful staff, and better interaction
with providers and policy makers. We hope to improve services
to future families as well by talking with our lawmakers about
needed changes to the system to make it more of what families
need. We are seen as a resource to lawmakers, the system,
and many groups around the State, which we see as a huge accomplishment.
Our face-to-face resource center has reached far more families
than we projected and we have a good foundation to build upon
in another region of our State.
Positive Impact
Our face-to-face resource center has touched numerous
lives through advocacy and financial help to get services
or products to help them. One family has a child with autism
who was unable to sleep through the night without getting
up over and over again, causing the family to struggle. Through
a small financial grant in cooperation with our local systems,
the family could purchase a simple adaptive technology and
now they ALL sleep through the night. Very simple, very effective
to get a family what they needed at the right time.
Maryland Top
Governor's
Office of Children
Mission and Goals
Baltimore Families First (BFF) is a family support and
resource program for Baltimore City parents, grandparents,
or other caregivers who are caring for a child, age 0–18 years
of age with a developmental disability and/or severe mental
health or behavioral health need (“a child with intensive
needs”). We provide information and referral to families covering
a variety of programs and services such as child care, camps,
special education training and advocacy, and parent support
groups. BFF also provides more intensive assistance to certain
families by working with each to create a plan to meet the
needs of their family, as follows:
• Grandparents raising a grandchild with these special needs.
• Families who have a child with a dual developmental disability
and mental health diagnosis.
• Families residing in an Empowerment Zone community of Baltimore.
Our mission is to keep children with families together in
Baltimore, increase Baltimore City families’ awareness to
the various resources available for their children, create
a more streamlined process for getting resources, and empower
families to advocate for themselves.
Accomplishments
BFF is being used by the Governor of Maryland’s Office
for Children as the model for the creation of other county
programs for families of children with developmental disabilities
and other intensive needs around the State. Since commencing
operations in March 2005, BFF has supported 73 families per
individualized plans of care, several of whom have become
involved in our project as members of the Parent Steering
Committee.
Positive Impact
As told by one of our staff of our Family Navigators:
“I invited one of our families that I had been working with
for a few months—a grandmother guardian (referred to as Ms.
K.) of five children, two of whom have a developmental disability,
to attend a local conference on Assistive Technology for communication
and environmental controls. Vendors from around the United
States were in attendance to present their wares. Ms. K. was
very interested in one of the products for her granddaughter,
who is 16 and has cerebral palsy. The conference broke for
a ‘show and tell’ session where attendees were invited to
try out the equipment. I needed to leave early for another
appointment but encouraged Ms. K. to talk with the owner of
the company that created the particular product line. Ms.
K. was a bit nervous at first as this was all new for her.
She called me the next day and told me she had not only talked
with the owner about his product line, but invited him to
meet her granddaughter, who was then recovering from surgery
at Kennedy Krieger Institute (KKI). He agreed and took her
out to lunch, then on to KKI where he spent the afternoon
working with the granddaughter and identifying areas where
he could make product changes to accommodate her needs. Ms.
K. also introduced him to the KKI staff and arrangements were
made for him to come back to town and work with KKI at a future
date. This grandmother told me she found it difficult to believe
someone in such a position would be interested in what she
had to say. Ms. K. is just now becoming aware of her own personal
power and is an excellent advocate for her granddaughter in
moving her to independence and self-determination.”
Massachusetts Top
Commonwealth
of Massachusetts, Department of Mental Retardation
Mission and Goals
The mission of SCAN 360 is to create linkages among a
network of human service agencies, service providers, and
community resources in Springfield to better coordinate information
and support to families who have a member with a developmental
disability. Outreach is targeted to lower income and culturally
diverse families. The SCAN 360 Family Center provides information
and referral assistance to any family who contacts the Center,
a resource library, connections to parent mentors, support
groups, and trainings. Case mangers help families from one
of our priority groups develop plans for what services they
need, and helps them find out where and how to obtain these
services and resources.
Accomplishments
1. We successfully moved into the Family Center, an ideal
and accessible location in the heart of Springfield. This
location includes space for a resource library and a conference
room for trainings and meetings which we can make available
to other groups to use as well.
2. Outreach efforts have been very successful in the development
of a strong referral base, reaching all of our target groups.
The Center receives an average of five calls per day for Information
and Referral and staff have successfully worked with families
in the development and completion of Action Plans and goals.
3. Start up of volunteer and parent mentor projects.
Positive Impact
Center staff worked with a family who moved from Puerto
Rico to Springfield, MA. They have three children, two of
whom have special needs. Staff helped them obtain appropriate
Individual Education Plans and school placements. They helped
them apply for food stamps, fuel assistance, and health insurance
(Masshealth—Medicaid) and obtain needed medical and dental
care, and psychological services. The family was assisted
in finding an affordable apartment, employment for the parents,
and clothing and shoes for the children. The family was also
helped to resolve some legal issues they were facing. The
family is now independent and they volunteer regularly at
the Center.
Michigan Top
Developmental
Disabilities Institute
Mission and Goals
To use the Detroit Family Support 360o One-Stop Center
to help low income, minority families with a family member
with a developmental disability to preserve, strengthen, and
maintain their families.
Accomplishments
The success of the Family Support Groups, including the
newly formed “Men’s Group.”
The Family Support Navigator’s part in helping families to
be successful.
Discussions with local, county, and State policymakers regarding
the sustainability of the project.
The variety of project staff is very successful for working
with families of different cultures and the translation for
families who do not read or speak English.
Positive Impact
A family had successfully participated in the project,
yet additional supports were identified by the grandmother
for her grandson. When her grandson turned 5, he stopped receiving
formula from the Women, Infants, and Children Program. The
Family Support Navigator and the grandmother had to figure
out how to get Children’s Special Healthcare Services to pay
for formula. The grandmother speaks Spanish and needed help
from the Project’s bilingual Family Support Navigator. With
the Navigator’s help, the grandmother was able to schedule
an appointment with her grandson’s gastrointestinal specialist
to complete the required Medicaid forms. As a result the grandson
now receives formula through Children’s Special Healthcare
Services.
Minnesota Top
Governor's
Council on Developmental Disabilities/Jordan New Life Community
Church
Mission and Goals
The Jordan New Life One-Stop Family Support Center exists
to empower families who have a member with developmental disabilities
to become more independent, productive, self-determined, integrated,
and included.
Accomplishments
One accomplishment was the design, implementation, and
use of the Individual Family Plans. These allow families to
provide direct input and steering for their personal goals,
and to map out a realistic timeline for accomplishing the
goals.
A second accomplishment was bringing the New Life Laundry
(laundromat) under the umbrella of the center to address an
immediate need for clients of the center who are seeking an
affordable, safe environment in which to do their laundry.
Positive Impact
One of our parents came in having developed MS. She had
been laid off from her job and had no resources. With the
help of a navigator, she was able to secure medical assistance,
food stamps, public assistance and long-term disability (from
the employer) in a period of less than 1 month. Her disease
is in remission and the family is doing well.
Missouri Top
Visions
with Hope 360
Mission and Goals
Our goal is to provide support services to Latino families
that have children with disabilities. We will provide information
about disabilities, peer support, and in-depth family planning.
Accomplishments
The number of families participating in the family support
group meetings continues to increase (currently at least 33
families are participating monthly).
The Visions with Hope Center moved into a new facility that
is central to many of the families being served by the center.
The new one-stop center has rooms for family therapy, childcare,
meeting rooms for community meetings, and office space for
local agency staff.
Positive Impact
A mother of the program attended a conference on autism
hosted by the Regional Center. She is bilingual and willing
to share with other parents what she has learned.
Five new families started attending the Parents Support Group
and receiving other services from Visions.
The number of fathers attending the PSG increased this quarter
by 80 percent in comparision with the last quarter of participation.
New Hampshire Top
Under
One Roof Project
Mission and Goals
The Under One Roof Project provides opportunities for
people to fully participate in the rural communities in which
they live. Our goals are to:
1. Help community members value the strengths and abilities
of all of us.
2. Develop “The River Center: A place for community connections
and resources” into a model for how a variety of organizations
and people of all abilities support one another.
3. Connect people with disabilities and their families to
local opportunities for family support, recreation, and employment.
Accomplishments
This past winter, The River Center buildings, which are
old, became physically accessible as a result of successful
fundraising by The Family Center. Project bridge builders
works with individuals, families and also works in the community
to develop new opportunities. This past year, our local ski
mountain became accessible to people of all ages and abilities.
This was accomplished with lots of collaboration, instruction,
and meetings. We continue to work with a regional high school
and the chambers of commerce (group of business leaders) to
include students of varying abilities in a new “first jobs”
program.
Positive Impact
Dan, 19 ½ years old, attends the Life Skills program at
the high school. Dan’s family experienced a crisis and Dan
could no longer live with them. When his parents contacted
the project, Dan was without a means to express himself, a
transition plan, a supportive place to live, or a vision for
his future. We have worked with the parents, who now lead
the effort to bring together a dedicated group of advocates
to help Dan plan his future. This future vision includes a
job where he’s appreciated, a reliable form of communication,
a semi-independent living situation near his family, friendships,
a healthy lifestyle, and music. This is a work in progress.
New Mexico Top
Center
for Development and Disability
Mission and Goals
Develop Family Support Centers in the five pueblos of
Sandoval County, NM. Family support centers will locally assist
individuals with developmental disabilities and their families
to access services and supports.
Accomplishments
The project has been guided by a steering committee of
families and tribal leaders from each pueblo along with collaborating
State and local partnering agencies. In this way, we have
been able to hear from the families themselves about services
and activities that are most needed, and each family support
center has been customized for the local community access.
Positive Impact
An individual with developmental disabilities walked into
the family support center with multiple needs. The most pressing
was the shoebox he carried with him. In the shoebox were several
outdated and broken hearing aides. He had saved them from
childhood and none of them fit or worked properly. He requested
assistance to fix the hearing aides. The Family Resource Specialist
was able to connect him with a program to help him to receive
a new set of hearing aides, as well as assistance in transportation
t
North Carolina Top
University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Mission and Goals
The mission of the Strengthening Families One Stop project
is to support families with children who have developmental
disabilities through a culturally responsive, integrated,
community-based system of information and referral, service
delivery, and follow-up.
The goals of the project are to:
• Strengthen linkages among State and local organizations
to benefit families with children with developmental disabilities.
• Establish a model of service coordination that involves
parents as service coordinators collaborating with professional
service coordinators.
• Use and refine an information and referral system to serve
as a single point of entry for families.
• Facilitate statewide replication of the Strengthening Families
One Stop.
Accomplishments
The One Stop project is especially proud of the following:
1. Developing an innovative model for serving families with
children who have developmental disabilities.
2. Establishing a comprehensive information and referral system
for families with children who have developmental disabilities.
3. Facilitating strong collaboration among local and State
organizations that serve families with children who have developmental
disabilities.
4. Developing and implementing strong tools to evaluate the
effectiveness of project activities.
Positive Impact
Family X has two adopted 3-year-olds, a son with a cognitive
delay and a sleep disorder, and a daughter with significant
behavioral and emotional problems. In addition to the challenges
posed by the children's needs, the father almost lost his
job when he had surgery for a nerve injury. The mother became
frustrated and depressed.
Through the Strengthening Families One Stop Project, the family
was matched with information and emotional support. The family
was able to get basic information from a sleep disorder specialist.
The father was connected with local vocational rehabilitation
and labor relations offices. Through the One Stop, the family
was able to get the additional resources and supports that
they needed.
Oklahoma Top
Oklahoma
Health Sciences Center
Mission and Goals
Provide a family resource center to help families meet
the challenges of raising children with developmental disabilities.
Accomplishments
Provided families with over 340 services and referrals.
Provided training to 44 pediatric providers who work with
children with disabilities.
Created the Community Resource Team. This team meets monthly
and is made up of community agencies, service providers, and
parent groups.
Created the Family Advisory Group with parents enrolled in
the 360° Center project. This group will review the 360° Center’s
policies and procedures manual, and help evaluate the 360°
Center services.
Positive Impact
One family who has a child with breathing problems lost
their air conditioning unit. With no air conditioner, the
child would have to go into the hospital. The 360° Center
worked with the Department of Human Services, Energy Assistance
Program, and a local retail store to buy a window air unit.
The family was able to stay home.
Project
Related Media Story
Oregon Top
Human
Services Research Institute
Mission and Goals
Staff at Juntos Podemos offers families of children with
developmental disabilities a place where they will be welcomed
and heard, and linked to the services they need whenever possible.
The Center also offers families opportunity to offer mutual
support and partner with community organizations and businesses
to support families. While the Center focuses on Latino families,
all families are welcome.
Accomplishments
We have excited families and the community about the project.
Our last family get-together was well attended, with community
businesses pitching in. Families are doing more together,
helping each other out, and volunteering to help the Center.
Meanwhile, State and county agencies are taking notice and
want to participate more.
Positive Impact
It has helped more than one in a similar way. For the
first time families feel that they have a place of their own
where they are welcomed and heard, can get some of the support
they need, and get information and guidance about other agencies
that can help them too.
Rhode Island Top
Paul
V. Sherlock Center on Disability at RI College
Mission and Goals
This project focuses on young adults with cognitive learning
disabilities as they transition into the adult world. Part
of the project focuses on the school to adult world transition.
Another part is focused on one of the most challenging aspects
of adult life being a parent with a disability.
Accomplishments
The Supportive Parenting Project supports the parenting
efforts of parents with learning challenges. To participate,
a parent must be currently involved in CASSP, self-identified
as having learning, cognitive, and parenting challenges, and
currently raising a child or children. Family Support 360
supports families of youth with developmental disabilities
to plan and carry out effective transitions to meaningful
adult lives. Eligible families are those with transition-age
students with the most significant disabilities—those who
will clearly be eligible for services through the Division
of Developmental Disabilities when they turn 21.
Positive Impact
The Supportive Parenting Program has empowered a mother
with DD to become a more effective self-advocate in her successful
struggle to have her child returned to her custody. Currently,
she is participating in system advocacy initiatives of the
DD Council. She is also participating in the creation of a
parent-to-parent support group for parents with cognitive
learning challenges.
South Dakota Top
South
Dakota Department of Human Services
Mission and Goals
Mission
Empowering people to achieve their dreams through choice of
services and supports.
Goals
To support each person to make decisions.
To support each person’s choices to live and work in their
community.
To assist each person to explore available community resources
and services.
Accomplishments
The PLANS project received approval for an amendment to
the Family Support HCBS waiver. This will allow adults to
access needed waiver services. The PLANS project also started
a third local program, serving people in western South Dakota.
Positive Impact
Story 1
A young man is currently working part-time at a Video
Store in Sioux Falls, SD, where he contracted with the same
job coach that he had previously worked with through Vocational
Rehabilitation Services. He has a great support network through
his coworkers. He walks independently to a grocery store to
purchase groceries after receiving pedestrian safety training
from his provider who provided bus training in addition to
the training provided by the transit service. Through referrals
to Social Services and Sioux Falls housing, he is currently
on the waiting list for housing assistance and is receiving
food stamps.
Story 2
A woman is learning to deal with a whole new world, the
world of work. With the support of a friend and a job coach,
she is learning to make beds, clean bathrooms in record times,
and get along with coworkers, her supervisor, and the public
who frequent the hotel where she works. Paydays are exciting
for her, but equally so are the days she gets herself to work
on the bus that she’s learned to use, puts in a full shift
“just like everyone else,” and has some fun joking with coworkers
along the way—all for the first time in her life
Utah Top
Utah
State University
Mission and Goals
The Disability Support Center for Families mission is
to improve the quality of life for children, youth, and adults
with developmental disabilities and their families in an economically
disadvantaged and ethnically diverse area of Salt Lake City.
Accomplishments
The Disability Support Center for Families has started
a loaner ramp program for individuals who are in need of accessing
their homes. A partnership with Assist, a Home Modification
and Accessibility Design and Development organization, helps
with obtaining available funding for permanent structures.
In addition, every October the Center participates in the
National Disability Mentoring Day, where we partner with local
businesses for job shadowing opportunities for individuals
with developmental disabilities. We also provide once-a-month
family trainings in English and Spanish related to IDEA, stress
management, and communication skills training.
Positive Impact
Several months ago, the Disability Support Center for
Families assisted an individual with developmental disabilities
who was kicked out of her home by her mother. The center assisted
with advocating for supported living services with a State
agency that currently has a waiting list for supports. In
addition, food stamps and Medicaid were also applied for—she
received the assistance for food but was denied Medicaid.
This individual was in need of long-term supports and management.
By receiving supports from the State agency, a support coordinator
was assigned to assist with the long process of appealing
social security benefits and Medicaid. This coordinator will
also help her with paying her bills, cooking, managing her
apartment, and any other needs that she will have in the future
to be as self-sufficient as possible.
Vermont Top
Green
Mountain Family Support 360
Mission and Goals
The mission of the work I do is to empower families and
support them while working their way through everyday life.
I also help show families the people and offices where they
can get help.
Accomplishments
This project has helped families find people and offices
where they have gotten help with life’s hardships. I am proud
of the many referrals that continue. This shows me that my
community sees the value in my Peer Navigator role.
Positive Impact
My role has given many an opportunity to be heard by a
nonagency service provider. I think this is very important.
Many of the families I serve have not had the help they need
because they don’t really fit into many of the existing supports.
I have a personal success story in that one of the families
I work with has overcome many road blocks they tell me they
would not have overcome if I had not been there to support
them.
Wisconsin Top
Wisconsin
Department of Health and Family Services
Mission and Goals
Family Support 360 works with families in Madison, WI,
and nearby communities who are currently underserved or under-represented
in the current human service system. The Project helps families
access needed services and improve the responsiveness of long-term
and family supports. Monthly educational opportunities for
families and professionals about resources, local issues,
and advocacy skill building are provided. The resource center
is available for families and professionals by calling or
stopping in. A Family Support 360 advisory structure, with
parents as active participants, guides all project activities.
Accomplishments
In the last year The Family Support Project:
• Continued participating in the development and implementation
of the Functional Screen with a variety of community partners.
• Project Coordinator Chaired the Wisconsin Council on Children
With Long-Term Support Needs at the request of the DHFS Secretary.
• Met with the DHFS Secretary in March and will respond to
her request for suggestions to increase the pace of reform
in the children’s system.
• Had significant outreach to school bilingual resource specialists
and social workers resulting in an increasing number of referrals
from these partners.
• Continued to expand the materials available to families
and partner agencies at the Harambee Center to increase the
center’s long-term capacity to respond to families who have
children with disabilities.
• Collaborated with Family Support and Resource Center to
sponsor the Connecting Families Conference.
• Developed and implemented monthly educational opportunities
for families and service providers.
Positive Impact
A family moved here from Uruguay and was interested in
finding activities for their 19-year-old daughter with a developmental
disability because she enjoyed being involved in many activities.
Family Support 360 staff assisted them in calling various
agencies, such as Very Special Arts, Special Olympics, and
the school system to decide what recreation was available
for their daughter. Staff also helped contact a high school
she could attend and set up a meeting with the family and
a school representative to determine special education eligibility
and programming options. The child was deemed eligible and
now attends high school. The family was very surprised and
grateful for the opportunity for their child to attend school
and receive transition services.
Project
Related Media Story
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