001certain okay okay so um I am just G to check out one thing before we get started ah it's up now okay and we're back would you like to start again because I don't think it was pling it's your choice okay so what I will do for the sake of time we were um looking we had some technical difficulties thank you for tuning in with us we had a very meaningful um opening with a moment of spoken word perhaps we can put the link in the chat for individuals to view the video following the presentation but we'll move forward for the sake of time I want to welcome our listening audience for tuning in um tonight we have such abundant resources here from you and some awesome experts from agencies represented I want to start
002off by introducing myself my name is Yolanda Hamilton I am the diversity equity and inclusion consultant working on behalf of the grael height City School District I will also serve as your moderator this evening at this time I would just like to acknowledge our representatives from the garville high school district who are on and responsible for convening this program for tonight Dr Gordon Dupri who is our director of pupil Services Miss Gina Wilson who is our family and Civic engagement coordinator and Miss Sherry Bailey who is our director of technology so before we get started are there any opening words that our district Representatives would have for this Audi the audience this evening if not we can go ahead and move on into our program so I wanted to start out tonight with just saying
003wow 2020 what a year right everything that we have been presented with definitely has had an impact on our mental health and mental well-being I wanted to start off tonight by sharing a few key foundings from Mental Health America and as you see me glancing back and forth I am looking at notes checking the chats we want this to be very engaging tonight and so feel free to put comments in the chat box as we're talking or thoughts about the information that's being presented and I want to go ahead and share a few of these findings from Mental Health America Mental Health America reports that youth mental health is worsening 99.7% of Youth in the US have experienced a severe major depression compared to 99.2% of Youth last year and this rate was actually higher
004amongst more diverse populations particularly youth who identified as having more than one race we also know that even before the onset of covid-19 the prevalence of mental health was increased amongst adults so Mental Health America reports that in 2017 to 2018 19% of adults reported experiencing Mental Illness but more alarming um the rate of suicide amongst adults is also increasing and the percentage of adults in the US who are experiencing serious thoughts of suicide increased by 0.15% from 2016 to 2017 and then from 2017 to 20 2018 it was reported that an additional 460,000 people were um experiencing severe Suicidal Thoughts so just let that sit in with you it it indicates that we have a severe crisis going on in the midst of the pandemic and we can't continue to neglect or have the
005conversation um the percentage of adults with mental health mental illness who are uninsured has increased for the first time and as we know many people have had a significant impact from their employment based on layoffs and furlows from covid-19 so in essence all of these things have have an impact on the overall mental health and well-being of our families in the district and Beyond and so those statistics to me indicate a need for us as a community to really take the time to take the issue of mental health seriously and the fact is as being an African-American woman I know that in the African-American Community Mental Health is a stigma we don't talk about it we identify ourselves as being strong or persevering through things when really we need to talk with someone we need
006to have advice on coping strategies and really face it head on and so um African-Americans are less likely to seek out therapy right and I think that therapy is a healthy healthy thing if you need to talk with someone talking to a expert or professional that is part of practicing self-care so tonight again we hope that you would engage with us during the conversation and if you could just start off in the chat tonight if you are tuning in and let's just start off even as we before we enter into this dialogue with our agency Representatives if you could just put a thumbs up emoji in the chat saying that you will commit to practicing um what you need to support your mental health and better selfcare for this year I can't type in the
007chat but you see my thumbs up um and I am committed to that for this evening so at this time I would like to just welcome our guests who are here um our experts again we have awesome agencies represented to our guests I would like to just ask um a few house rules if you could just adhere to um keeping your microphones muted when you're not speaking also I want to make sure that we have given ample of time to each of our agency Representatives who have taken time to be with us this night so I ask that you respectfully adhere to the time constraints that I give when I Poe questions out so that we can make sure that we're able to get fair questions to all the agencies that are represented so in
008starting off I'm going to ask you in 30 seconds or less um if you could start off by just introducing yourself by giving your name the agency that you're in your title the agenc see that you're representing a brief Mission something really quick like your this your elevator speech and also if you could make a brief mention of the insurances that you accept that would be great as well so I want to start off with Applewood hello my name is Britney mlan I am a licensed social worker with Applewood School based uh therapist um insurances that we take we take um all of them pretty much Medicaid um we currently have a grant so we are even accepting people without insurance um so that's pretty cool what else did you say I think that was
009it anything else did I miss something I think that was great thank you I would like on to beachbrook hi my name is Matthew Corbett I'm from beachbrook I'm a supervisor at beachbrook I supervise uh Serena Young who works in Garfield Heights and I also supervise Paula Parker who's in um Garfield Heights um we provide uh beef trick focuses on uh improving the lives of Children and Families um we do that through um Mental Health Services individualized counseling Behavioral Health Therapy um we also offer um psychiatric um Services U for medication um the insurances that we take are um all the Medicaid hmos um we do not take private insurance although we do um much like um the other agencies we can provide consultation to um students who need it um if they don't have
010insurance okay thank you very much um beat Belfair um we take basically all insurance I work in the homeless and missing Youth Department so Insurance isn't really involved until we do referrals out to um parent and Children Therapy or Ohio transitions project or um any of the other programs that we offer um but in the homeless and missing Youth Department we've just been doing a lot of Outreach to um homeless and runaway youth during this time and trying to get them to resources and um housing to make sure that they can be safe throughout the pandemic thank you and really quick what is your title there I'm the street Outreach coordinator okay thank you moving on Big Brothers Big Sisters hello I'm Jessica Walters I'm the president and CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters of
011Greater Cleveland we're a onetoone mentoring organization so we match up kids with adult volunteers who've been through our screening process and match them into a one-on-one mentoring relationship we offer um online mentoring right now it's new for us in 2020 um and our traditional program would be you know you're picking the the volun the big brother or big sister is picking up the child at their home and then they're going out to do things in the community so we still are offering that program but we're really focusing on Virtual um and all of our programs are free of charge okay thank you very much Catholic Charities hi good evening my name is Michelle kinsella I'm a care coordinator in Catholic Charity's tapestry program um the program you know sometimes uh heard refer to as tapestry
012or system of care or wraparound but really wraparound is the best way to explain the program that is what we do we're wrapping um young children and families around Services kids come to us usually involved with children family services and or juvenile court so we're looking to provide services wraparound Services mental health services so that that youth can remain in the home um and avoid further juvenile court involvement or placement outside of the home residential or or foster care or something like that okay thank you so much we we do mental health assessments on our kids um if they have Medicaid um but if they don't have Medicaid we still provide the wraparound services but if they are found to have a mental health diagnosis we'll do um some cpst Services okay thank you um
013Catholic we have Catholic Charities next is Ohio guid Stone hello everyone uh my name is Lynn Franks I'm a Community Counseling supervisor at Ohio guid Stone in our school-based program um we have four therapists and one commun mental health worker that are in the school district um besides our school-based mental health program we do have um an outpatient counseling office in Garfield Heights we also provide um inhome counseling substance use disorder counseling Adult Services uh Pro kids which is a diversion program with um kayaga County Juvenile Court um and we have Psychiatry and also psychological testing um insurances that we accept is Medicaid and then we also U provide consultation as well okay thank you we'd like to go to Heart toart okay and moms and babies first do we have a representative on from
014Mom and Highland Springs good evening everyone my name is Rachel I am the senior Business Development representative for Highland Springs and changes Highland Springs is an adult facility in Beachwood that focuses on mental health and substance use treatment we have inpatient and outpatient group services for adults 18 and over changes as a Child and Adolescent program also focusing on substance use and mental health um and that is group outpatient for children ages 8 to 17 we take most commercial insurances Medicare United Health Care Medicaid and um for the patient Only We Take Care Source Medicaid as well and Buckeye so I always forget about Buckeye it's new okay so we'll go ahead and get started and I'll start off with a with a question um targeted towards beachbrook and Highland Springs as I mentioned in
015the opening comments mental health is Al often a stigma in certain cultures and because of this many parents themselves don't recognize when they or them themselves or their children would be in need of seeking out support so what are some of the signs that would indicate someone should reach out to your Agency for help I I can go first um I would say the things to look for are extreme behaviors um when the child um is doing things more than they normally would um and also less than they normally would they're not enjoying the same activities they really used to get into um if you've got a um a football player who no longer wants to go play football or a video gamer who doesn't really want to get on the game station anymore then
016that's an indication that they may be suffering from depression um so those are the kinds of things I always encourage parents to look for is um Extremes in one end or the other when they're doing nothing or doing too much of something okay thank you so much and Highland Springs if you could chime in from your perspective yeah I would say I would say that's um a really great advice change in Behavior change in Attitude um oftentimes you'll see if someone is struggling they're on um you know to Matt's point they're on a really overe excited end of do you know behaving in a way that they don't normally or they really withdraw and they don't want to do things anymore um we see that in adults and we see that in kids um you
017also want to look for things like lying um sneaking around around making excuses a lot of times that's just trying to cover up um A coping mechanism that really isn't positive like using a substance or um self harm yeah that those are good points sometimes masquerading is other behaviors that are not necessarily showing oh you're not walking around and Gloom and just you know overbent and and looking depressed but you're you're having those other behaviors masquerading thank you very much so my next question is how can we dig these stigma the need for therapy and mental health support and I would like to pose that question particularly to Applewood and Ohio gu Stone how can we de stigmatize the need for therapy or mental health in 60 seconds or less hi Applewood here um one
018of the things that I try to do is just build relationships with these parents um building relationships and letting people know hey it's okay to need a little bit of help it's okay and some of the things that I tell them all the times is it takes a village you have to know what's going on and things like that um but definitely building relationships and letting people know that it's okay to need help or it's okay to need this service and just letting them feel comfortable meeting people where they are at that moment okay thank you I'm going to agree with all that you know it's very important to have those relationships and um you know letting somebody know that it's okay to ask for help to find those um supports whether it be um
019you know with school staff or you know especially if you have a school staff that they have a good relationship with them normalizing it and letting them know that it's okay to you know seek help and talk to someone right so you mean that asking for help is not a sign of being weak not at all okay so we heard that could I chime in on that too I'm sorry absolutely one of the things to do though too is not if someone's suffering from depression and and they are worried about how they're going to be you know viewed then then you don't of course we have to label depression for billing and whatnot but we talked to them about the the the symptoms and help them and treat the symptoms and not worry so much
020about the label and what it is you know people don't want to be labeled as having depression or anxiety or you know what I mean so if you just remove that and just treat the symptoms that may help um destigmatize some of this yes so I'd like to ask um Highland Springs you wanted to chime in to this also yeah I think one of the things we talk about all the time with destigmatizing is use the language talk about it it's you know that is how you normalize something is to talk about it it is okay to say the word depression it is okay to say the word suicide it is okay to say those words and and people talking about it as if it is just as common because it is as cancer as
021diabetes as any other um ailment out there if we just talk about it like normal we will distin ize it eventually okay this makes me think um just for a question personally that I had where do you think the origin and this is for any agency that would like to answer what do you think the origin of the um the shaming in terms of people um coming to grips with having issues with their mental health where do you think that originated I'm sure there's a scientific answer to that or something more appropriate but if you go back and look at all of our history books what did they do to people with anxiety and depression 150 200 years ago Salem said they were witches right people were locked up people were beaten to death people
022had all these terrible things happen to them so I think that's in been ingrained in us for decades upon decades right so probably like the institutionalized practices around how mental health um individuals with mental health um were treated and I think you're yeah that that's that would be interesting to delve further into that so moving on to our next question and I'm going to specifically um pose that to Catholic Charities and big brothers and big sisters like during the pandemic specifically um parents and kids and so what are some of the first of all what are some of the top three reasons that someone would reach out to your organization for support well fortunately or unfortunately families come to us not through self-referrals so families come to us through children Family Services or juvenile court
023so um we're not getting families voluntarily okay lot families that come through um it's a lot of self-referral for us and I think in our case It's when um parents recognize that they could use a little backup and they they could use someone else to build a relationship and help reinforce some of the things that many of the parents themselves are saying but it doesn't always sink in so adding another positive adult role model can be really helpful on some of these things it just provides another Outlet okay so that's good to know and I know you mentioned earlier that there are virtual services so I know that many families in the district probably have children that could benefit from having a virtual Mentor or someone that they can talk to during this time I
024want wanted to pose another question some of the agencies during the introductions mentioned that you offer Consultation Services can you just explain because we want to not assume that the listening audience knows what those Consultation Services are if you could just explain maybe in 60 seconds or less what exactly are the Consultation Services that you offer and anyone who would like to respond that provides consults can chime in I can go ahead so I would say like if some if School staff notices um a child experiencing some you know concerning behaviors like withdraw um you know or some you know misbehaviors or some anxious behaviors we can have a therapist meet with them just to kind of assess and see if some you know additional Services would be necessary or helpful so that's typically what
025we do with consultation okay and of course those are conducted virtually yes everything is virtual at this time with Ohio guid Stone okay okay anyone else any other agencies that offer Consultation Services would like to chim me in um this is Britney with Applewood we pretty much do the same exact thing um say we get a kid and you're like um they're not really depressed maybe something's just going on but you don't really want to give them a diagnosis or you're not ready to give them a diagnosis we do consultation and you can get um six to 10 sessions so it can be every week or I can spread it out to every other week or it can be once a month maybe they're only having issues at this time at this class um it
026just really depends on that child and what um what was recommended but it's pretty much the same and I'd like to clarify for the listening audience just if if someone wanted to take advantage of reaching out to you all for referrals or resources they don't necessarily have to have a diagnosis correct so you don't have to have a diagnosis to receive therapy correct okay so I think I want to just clarify that because I think that's also another um miscommunication that many individuals have and also I think the question that they might be asking themselves is how can we get Services if I don't even know what I need like how can I get your services if I don't even know what I need so what would you say to someone that's on the listening
027end tonight asking thems that question sorry to interrupt I think part of that is part of the Consultation Services um we we call those at at Highland Springs and ch no cost assessments so what that means is someone can come in 247 we are always available or they can set up an appointment for in person or virtual and we do a level of care assessment so we talk with the person we find out what's going on we're not giving you a diagnosis sitting in the chair and talking with us we're trying to figure out where you are what's your Baseline what the crisis is what level your crisis is and what level of care you meet criteria for if it's not level one of the levels of care that we offer because we are a
028more acute facility so we do offer um group programming for um intensive therapeutic programming if you just meet level of care for you know an outpatient therapist we'll give you resources and we'll connect you with referrals and every Agency on here we work with for that exact reason because we all do something a little bit different okay and for how long can you get received can a person receive Consultation Services I know um for Apple will we get 10 sessions six to 10 sessions each school year so then next school year say they needed it again for whatever reason and we didn't give them a diagnosis we can do it again next school year and it'll get another six to 10 sessions okay and we do about six as well okay I believe our average
029is about five sessions five sessions okay and Melle I think you said silence Springs is 10 no we're we're a level of care assessment so you're going to come in and see us any time there is a crisis you can come in so um you know if a child is struggling and it's once a month that there is an episode that needs addressed or something you know you can call us anytime we don't have a limit um but we evaluate in that moment what level of care they need and get them connected with the right programming if it's our progr programming um it depends on what level they come in at and how long they would be with us okay okay thank you so I want to take a pause here if everyone is still
030you know tuning in this is great information and helping you to better have an understanding of how to navigate accessing these these resources and again um Dr Gordon Dupri and Miss Gina Wilson they are both here in the district you can always work with them to have direct referrals to these agencies we really want to be supportive of you during this time because we understand on top of supporting your um kids with virtual learning having work obligations it is it is impacting your mental health and we just want to let you know that there are resources and services that are available so um Miss Wilson are there any questions that are coming in from the chat or from YouTube at this time that we need to pause to address so some of the questions I
031was adding in the chat I just received a question um and someone is asking about family counseling or family services um they want to know if this is just for students or can families reach out and get Services as a whole um at belfer we have parent and Children Therapy um packed is what we call it and we can make referrals there if you have any kind of Medicaid Care Source um and that is parent and Children Therapy for kids that have any sort of um conflict in the household kind of working through that with the parent um we also have respit homes so it's a 21 day um kind of we like to call it just a break so there's um it's not the child isn't taken out of the parents custody but sometimes
032we find that it's helpful for the child to get a break from the parent so they can spend up to 21 days in these respit homes where um they're placed with a family that's been approved by Belfair and um they kind of work through then they're also referred to packed where they're working through these problems that they might be having in the household with the parent um so that they kind of get that distance that they might need um while also working through their problems with the parents so they're not just taken out of the household giv a break and then put back in but they're actually like focusing on what the stum of the problem is there um so that's always a referral that can be made that's been very helpful for a lot
033of families very good and um I not Lynn from Ohio gu Stone wanted to chime in on this yes um you know it's so super super important to not work only with the child but to also incorporate the child um the parent um and the family or the guardian of the child you know you're only going to make so much changes working with just the child so um we do have um Psychotherapy for families as well um as a service and then also we have a relational skill building program um which helps a parent enhance their skills and their relationship with um their child okay that's good because we just had a question come up from the audience are there services that both parents and children can access together so that's good are there any
034other agencies that offer services whether it's mental health support or from the angle of Big Brothers Big Sisters and Catholic Charities that both parents and um students could access yeah Catholic Charities provides Community Based it's called cbfs Community Based Family Services um and sometimes even in tapestry if we're working with a family and they may need something a little bit more intense than what we can provide we'll refer them to um communitybased either individual or family based counseling and I can't speak to them as far as What insurances they provide um but certainly they would accept Medicaid but I don't know about private insurances okay Y and at Big Brothers Big Sisters we work primarily with children but um it's important for us to build a relationship with parents as well so every match that
035we have every child that's paired with a volunteer has a dedicated staff person that works with them so we can also help you know if parents would like a referral to Services you know my staff's very knowledgeable and we can kind of help Point people in the right direction but we don't have a formal program for parents okay so one one other question that came from our listening audience which I think is very important and also indicates why there's sometimes a reluctance if parents who need help um and do they have to to be concerned about Children and Family Service involvement if they are struggling with their own mental health we I I could take that question we are mandated reporters if we suspect there has been abuse or neglect we by law are mandated
036to report that however I always instruct all my therapists and workers that they're going to make a call like that they have to talk to the parent first it's really not um good practice to make a report without contacting the parent letting them know um what you're doing so we try to keep um an open honest relationship with our parents and keep you know because engagement like we said earlier engagement with the parents is key um so we try to keep them involved um and always know what we're doing so so I just wanna I just I'm sorry go ahead and add go ahead and TR I'm sorry I was just going to piggyback and it's it's just something that like I said we're always trying to build relationships with families so even when I
037meet a p a family and we're having our session I explain to them right away listen I am a mandated reporter if I ever see abuse or neglect I am coming to you but I have to report it and it's just communication patterns you just got to let people know in advance Y and I think we were talking before about the stigma of mental health and I think it's important to recognize that just because a parent is going through a mental health issue does not it's not the same as an abuse or neglect scenario so I think even though sometimes we cannect con those two issues it really is very separate and I think it's very courageous for parents to say hey I'm struggling with something um and you know I Pro all of us
038would probably applaud them for coming from for sharing that and we would work to help them deal with that and so it's not like a you're in trouble for letting us know and it doesn't necessarily equate to or equal to being like an abuse or neglect scenario at all pretty frequ so I want to you know we have different p percept or perspectives when you're dealing with different diverse demographics so let's just say I'm a parent I am stressed out I have kiddos at home I have to help them with virtual learning I am I have to go to work I have to cook I have to clean I I need to talk to somebody right I need to talk to somebody but there are times because I'm an essential worker I have to work
039outside the home so my kids do have to stay they're a little older not like we're not talking about lower elementary they might be middle school or high school they need to stay home by themselves and I might not always have a meal prepared for them but it's because I'm working so I just need to talk to somebody because I'm feeling a little depressed and heavy but I'm reluctant to reach out to for a referral because I don't want Job and Family Services involved to take my kids away I'm doing the best that I can what would you say to that person on the other end that's feeling that way because that's a very real sentiment in this hour um personally she's amazing you know what I mean like it takes a strong woman to
040be able to do something like that um you don't have to cook for your child every single day to be a great mom honestly we can get a pack of noodles and throw those in the microwave I mean it really just depends on what's going on children actually the state of Ohio um I looked this up before they don't have an age limit definitely not we're not leaving babies in the home alone but the state of Ohio does not have a age limit where it says the child has to be six seven or eight to stay in the house by themselves it actually says say if your child is responsible or if you feel your child is responsible does she need help absolutely do I applaud her for reaching out absolutely but I give her
041the help that I can find you know different Community Resources maybe we can find some after school programs that the kids can go to some tutor and some sports activities um you just want to find Community Resources and just be the rock that she's asking because it was really courageous for her to ask for help same as the last sorry go ahead no no go ahead I think it's the same as the the last question you asked about stigma and and you know Child Services just because we talk about it doesn't mean you know something bad is going to happen so just because this mom would call us and say hey I'm really struggling and I need some help that doesn't mean that oh my gosh the flags go off and it's abuse and neglect
042and you know it's it's a struggling parent and that's okay and the better option is for them to call and seek help the less great option is to not get any help let it keep getting worse until everything explodes and then all of a sudden a bunch of agencies are involved um so it's always a great idea to step in and get help and if there need to be additional resources any one of us on here I'm sure can connect somebody with that we do that all the time if you don't know what to do and you just need someone to guide you call us we'll guide you in the right direction we might not get the answer but we'll guide you and taking that one one step further I'm sorry is we have to
043De destigmatize children Family Services I tell families all the time they don't want your children you know there's no there's no harm in calling them and reaching out when you need help um that's an that's an agency available like every other agency you know I try to talk they're not the baby snatchers you know they don't want to place these kids so reaching out to them isn't always a bad thing and I think we need to destigmatize that agency as well because they may have resources that we don't know about they have access to you know furniture or clothing or food for families that maybe our agencies wouldn't have access to so I don't think we should you know I think we should educate families on that agency and not um so they don't have
044such a bad reputation yeah I think I I un I hear what you're saying I think the challenge is in trying to to to destigmatize that agency you know we see things on the news right and so that reinforces some of the sentiments that we might have and then not knowing what those experiences may have been in the past for families that may have been involved right and so I think also in terms of when we look at you know um cultural competent delivery of care like what constitutes negligence or abuse or neglect right it's the perception of the person who's doing the intake or working with that family so there might be some cultural things that one person may perceive as being neglected so like what it would be like for providers even to
045think about that like what are the standards what is proper protocol how do you engage with these families because definitely um with Catholic Charities just mentioned there there needs to be education because definitely there's a reluctance and a fear that people feel as though they're going to lose custody of their kids if they're dealing with mental health issues or if they reach out to support so definitely a lot of work to be done there um another question that came about in the chat is that are any of you the agencies able to provide services to students during school hours um the parent says I do not know what else I can do to give them a push and want and I really want them to do better through this learn virtual learning experience our programming
046for children and Adolescence is during school hours um so our intensive outpatient program is four days a week for three hours our partial hospitalization program is 5 days a week for four and a half hours um and we do have a teacher on site so the students are able to keep up with with their school work but they are with us um during that programming instead of at school or they're virtually with us um in a different setting instead of in in the school setting okay anyone else um at Belford we have the Ohio healthy transitions project Grant so um in our community independent treatment which is for older kids so I would say like high school age um they can be assigned a case manager who can help them with basically anything and a
047lot of the times what that need is is for school so they can help them during school hours it's a super flexible schedule it would be worked out between the parent the child and their case manager um so that's always an option as well if they just need a little bit more guidance or a little bit help getting put on a schedule or anything like that okay any other agencies go ahead yes Ohio guid Stone um can also provide um you know during the school day as long as you know the teachers are in agreement and um the principles okay I we also provide in School counseling if if if Allowed by the teachers and we also do in home and in the Community Counseling and work okay can I jump into absolutely we actually
048don't provide things during the school day but um we really especially with our virtual programs are really working with our volunteers to help them understand how they can support in helping with homework and schoolwork so you know if a parent is comfortable a b big or volunteer can communicate directly with a teacher and or really understand what's going on and sort of be that kind of extra support outside outside of school a lot of our volunteers are college students so you know there's a nice sort of peer aspect there too where they can work at Homework together and you know they're doing those things outside of school but we've added a much stronger focus on School this year because we recognize just every it's tough right everybody's struggling so um however we can we can
049help be part of that Squad we will right so helping to alleviate the burden for virtual learning or doing homework and having that support I know many parents could definitely benefit from that um also I wanted to pose another question that came from our chat with the pandemic is everything all of the services and everything that you offer is that solely durm virtual or are any of the agencies tonight are you offering any type of in-person services we're on a mix right now we have both options welfare is also mixed apple wood is also mixed but it's based on my preference so if I feel comfortable going out into the community it's totally fine um and I do that for some of my families that I know need me in person but majority of our
050things are telea Health okay Catholic Charities has just um not last week the week before has requested that we do not do any in-person sessions unfortunately no okay Ohio guid stone is uh predominantly virtual um if there's extreme circumstances we could do in person but um you know predominantly virtual Big Brothers Big Sisters is a mix too um where we really are pushing the virtual and everyone can always do virtual but we have you know if parents are comfortable and volunteers are comfortable they can meet in person as long as they're you know social distancing Winter's going to make it harder being outside that type of thing Beach book's doing a mix of iners and virtual okay a mix of iners and virtual okay so I'm being mindful of the time um we're about at
051six 648 so we have about 11 minutes left um I want to just go through a couple of other questions and I think that this these questions would be more relative to um all the agencies in general and however Miss Wilson if there are questions that continue coming through to the chat we want to definitely take those as well so I'll go into the next question um I want I want to learn how to help my child do you offer parent education we offer education at Highland Springs through or through Highland Springs through um some third-party organizations so we work um for example with the Jason Foundation um and they provide parent um education they also provide teacher education first responder education um but we we work with multiple programs to to provide that resource
052and that is at no cost okay um belf has been having virtual discussions called how not to be distant how not to be distant during distant learning um and those are zooms that I want to say are once a month I don't think that they're like scheduled too far in advance but we at Belfair have an Instagram called help in the CLE and um a zoom link is always shared on there for when there is virtual meetings and those are kind of how to to get parents involved and so parents can talk to one another and professionals about how to get their kids involved and how to help them out when they are doing online schooling okay so how not to be distancing during social distancing how not to be distant during distance learning okay
053so hard right I know yeah it's kind of complicated but the Instagram for Belfair is help inth CLE and we always share things on there like these kinds of meetings um and there's often resources for parents on like learning and stuff and then there's also in addition um like food clothing that kind of resources too okay great and I saw that one of our providers around relational skill building Ohio guid Stone would you like to speak to that sure yes we have um as I mentioned um in my intro our relational skill building program um which works with the parent and or Guardian to um you know help their relationship with their child and we focus on um you know defining those appropriate family roles um appropriate expectations of you know the development of the
054child um working on empathy and then also like um personal power okay okay and Highland Springs sorry I was typing it out um I we offer when when students are enrolled in our programming once a week the families come in and have touch bases with um the therapist or the nurse practitioner so we make sure that we're educating the parents on the tools that we're tools and skills that we're teaching their child and what they need to do at home to continue to support their child and support the family environment okay Big Brothers Big Sisters can you share a little about the resiliency program yep we received some grant funding this year through the Cleveland foundation in response to the pandemic and any family that is um receiving our services and their child is matched
055has access to that and essentially we can help you know with whatever that critical need is if you need support with food or we've had you know a parent that needed a bed or refrigerator or you know we will either connect you into the right place or we might be able to provide that um until my budget runs out but we really are looking to pass through as much of that as we can to our families because as an agency we are able to access it so we want to you know pass it along to our people no so that's good to know because we had a parent ask how do we get access to these resources so it's nice to know that your organization has grant funding available to help with those um basic
056and necessary needs during this time Y and I think probably any of the agencies on here um we could help Point people in the right direction to other organizations that provide services whether that's the furniture bank or the food bank or you know we have a lot of relationships that we can kind of help Point people in the right direction to okay great so I wanted to give either um Miss Wilson or Dr Dupri the time to chime in to share with everything that's been shared how what is the process in our district for um families or parents to access these services what we typic what we typically do uh Mrs Hamilton is a parent will call a school person maybe a principal maybe a guidance counselor a social worker and when we finally have
057a recommendation for service from an agency those referrals flow to Mrs Wilson Mrs Wilson would contact the appropriate agency to provide the service uh with uh as much or as little uh red tape as possible they all they need to do they can call a school they can call uh Mrs Wilson or they can call me okay yep also um if parents are in need of any resources as it pertains to meeting basic needs um I am also a person that they can contact um if they are in need of food shelter um again ba Meeting those basic needs I work really closely with our families whenever they contact me um and making sure that all of those resources are provided and I will be the first to say if I don't have a resource
058in hand I reach out in the community I reach out to agencies to see how we can work together to ensure that our families are receiving these resources that they need um before moving forward so I can be a point of contact at any time so thank you for um you know sharing that information with the audience I do want to mention you know because a lot of people have suffered loss of insurance D during this time can any other agency speak to any support or um services that they would provide for families who might have lost um insurance and are not able to um that would present a barrier for them accessing your services so right now at Applewood we actually received a grant so if the client was already in services and they
059lost their insurance we continue to see them um if there is a new uh referral and they lost their insurance we'd actually still open them up with the do an assessment of PDA and things like that and continue on so we actually have funding at the moment for those that do not have insurance and I I don't want to speak for the other agencies but I'm pretty sure everyone we all know how to um help people reapply and reup for their insurance so if that's a problem the family's having we're more than happy to help the families connect um either online or make a phone call or even go down to apply in person so okay we don't I think it's actually easy because it's on I think they're only taking phone calls at the
060moment so it's they just call and wraparound doesn't Bill insurance so we that would be a non-issue in our program okay so again the information shared here tonight so far it's just been really enlightening just to think that all of these resources are um in a sense some you know people not knowing what's available to them and and now you know and now it's your responsibility to reach out and to access those services and what I would like to challenge the listening audience to do is to you know go ahead reach out to Miss Wilson we're going to provide you with um her email address and email her tonight to make that commitment to follow through and take care of your mental health and to access these Services because it's going to help lighten the
061load and you're going to see the difference and the benefit from that and another question that actually came in is if we start Consultation Services and are you able to help Insurance excuse me are you able to help parents access insurance during that time yes so I would say that um you know that is one of the ways that we do utilize the consultation fund is you know we been begin to see the student and then we can help the parent in the process um you know apply for Medicaid or if for some reason their Medicaid lapsed you know we would help get that reinstated okay okay so great so in closing um I would like to just go around in 20 seconds and give each agency the opportunity just to share some closing words
062with the audience and so we will start with Applewood you started with me both times no but just in closing um just don't be afraid to reach out for help I mean it takes a village to raise a family and we are your village okay thank you and we're going in alphabetical order so no favoritism in case anyone was wondering I think I've been pretty fair I hope I've been fair in terms of engaging everyone in our dialogue tonight and we we um appreciate equally all of our agencies that are helping out our families in our community and in our school district um Beach Brook um I I would say uh it's a big ask but I would say parents they have to be a little vulnerable and they have to be able to say
063that they need help and I know that that's that's hard to do because it shows it may communicate a little bit of what comes across as weakness but it's not um there's a ton of services here there's a ton of people that all these people have um started their careers to help others and that's what we're here to do we love doing this um I think you'll like any of us once you talk to us and call us you will love talking to us you will enjoy us we all we want to do is help it's a lot of great people and um it was really nice to see so many people that um are just trying to help out tonight so I was really proud to be part of this thank you thank you
064Belfair um I would just add on to both of those things that you'd be surprised on what you can get services for um I feel like even at Belfair like there's services that are added all the time that I don't even know about until a few months later because there's so many agencies and so many resources so again like everyone else has been saying don't be afraid to reach out for help because there probably are resources even if you think it's probably doesn't exist I guarantee you it probably does and someone can help you find it so okay Big Brothers Big Sisters um I would add I think everybody is struggling a little bit right now so you know come back to destigmatizing um it's it's okay to ask for help and you know like
065everyone said we're all here for for that and we have noticed that parents are struggling so we actually have a a handful of spots available in our program so if you're interested in Big Brothers Big Sisters definitely talk to Gina um because we've got some volunteers who are waiting to be matched and you know I know families are juggling a lot so put us on your to-do list because we are available thank you CL Catholic Charities you know I was just sitting here thinking um you know this virtual stuff is kind of awkward and it's unfamiliar but you know one of the big things we do is help families um you know identify barriers and get over them well looking at this virtual stuff this is a great way for families to not have to
066leave their homes for services they can you know put in their earbuds and be on the bus and you can you know be having a conversation so I think um trying to look at the bright side of this is this will help us to access maybe more families that we weren't able to access before because they were embarrassed or they didn't want someone come into their home and their nosy neighbor seeing somebody knocking at their door whatever so you know looking at the bright side I think we you know um we just kind of need to embrace where we're at and share that with families thank you Ohio gu Stone everybody's always said all the stuff that I was thinking but um you know just again don't be afraid to ask for help you know
067all of us have joined this field for a reason we really do enjoy helping people so you know be afraid to reach out we have tons of resources I was going to speak to the virtual you know that's just so much more convenient right now I think so please please reach out to all of us okay and last but not least Highland Springs I think what I would like to add specific to my agency is that our phones are on 247 and we're staffed 247 with Master Level social workers so if you're not sure what to do and you need some guidance you can always call us there is no shame in calling and there's no commitment in calling um We'll advise you what to do we'll give you resources if we're not the right
068place for you we know everybody on this call and everybody in the county um so just reach out ask for the help it's it's okay it's not shameful it's the right thing to do great and a comment from our chat is that this was an awesome um meeting and that people appreciated this effort and so that shows us that our listening audience was engaged I would like definitely thank everyone for taking the time out to make this a priority in your work week and I'd like to close out by quoting some words of encouragement from former First Lady Michelle Obama she quotes to be a good parent you must take care of yourself so that you have the physical and emotional energy to take care of your family so let's live that out and let's
069access these Services again um we have a slide with the information for Miss Wilson and you can do the replay her email address I believe has been entered into the chat if you would like to reach out to her we just encourage you challenge yourself do it if you don't do it in the moment other things come up and then it comes to the bottom of the list so email her after this call she will be sure to follow up with you again thank you for everyone for tuning in I hope that you have a safe um upcoming holiday and again stay tuned for more updates that we'll have it's good to come together like this and share resources and so we anticipate future programming again thank you and have a good evening bye bye
070thank you