Welcome
Welcome to New Foundations’ third quarterly newsletter. Our
objective is to keep our staff, foster parents, children and other
social service professionals informed as to what is happening in
each of our offices. Since our newsletter will be available to view
on our website, we will use first names only in conjunction with
the children placed in our care. We are developing web pages to
display our children’s drawings and paintings, so please submit
any artwork you would like to have posted to your case manager,
supervisor or recruiter. We would also like to hear from our foster
families and our teenagers about your experiences with New Foundations
and the foster care system, so we also encourage you to submit your
accounts or stories to your case manager, supervisor or recruiter
as well. By sharing your accounts on our website, we would like
to provide a better understanding of the rewards and challenges
of foster parenting to prospective foster parents and other interested
parties.
About New Foundations
New Foundations is a private, non-profit child
welfare agency that is licensed by the Department of Public Welfare
to provide service to children and families in Philadelphia and
the surrounding counties. We currently serve 170 children and their
foster and biological families in the following ways:
- Foster Care Services
- Kinship Care Services
- Aftercare Services
- Adoption Services
- SCOH Services
Program Office News
New Foundations wishes everyone a healthy and happy holiday season.
Santa will be visiting both offices on December 16, 2005. Children
and families will be able to have their picture taken with Santa
as well as receive gifts, play games and enjoy a holiday feast.
The Chester office will also have a Christmas basket lottery for
our resource families.
New Foundations will be hosting a holiday party for staff on December
9th at Finnegan’s Wake, 3rd & Spring Garden Sts., Philadelphia
from 7:00 pm to 11:00 pm. Music will be provided by a DJ and a buffet
dinner will be served.
Center City Office
Deatrice Fields and Charles Mensah continue to do an excellent
job supervising both units in the Center City office. There are
currently over 130 children placed in resource homes (foster and
kinship) within these two units.
New Foundations welcomes Nafeesah Reed to the Center City office
as part of the case management team. Nafeesah started in October
and Deatrice reports that she is doing exceptionally well. Lancelot
Biggs also joined the team in late October and Charles reports he
is doing well also.
Certificates of appreciation were awarded to foster parents Catherine
Antrom, Eugenia Ketter and Marta Vinson as Foster Parents of the
Month for September, October and November, respectively. The Center
City staff will be hosting a foster parent appreciation event in
January, honoring all of the resource parents from the Center City
office.
Congratulations to secretary Yvonne Jones and case manager Kevin
Story for recent Employee of the Month awards. Kevin also celebrated
a new addition to his family in September. Case manager Sayjelah
Lundy will be furthering her education at the University of Phoenix,
working on a Master’s degree in Business. Congratulations
also to resource parents, Patricia Allen and Joyce Jones on winning
the two Thanksgiving Day baskets raffled off in November.
Chester Office
Office supervisor Sherron Samuels continues to do an excellent job
and seems to be settled in and enjoying her move to the Chester
office. Nicole Thompson joined the Chester staff as a casemanager
in September and Sherron reports that she has quickly become a part
of the team.
Our children have also been busy over the last couple of months.
Jay’quan was “Student of the Day” in October.
Domenic has started karate lessons. Mercedes received an award for
her presentation at her church. Bikeem has been selected for the
Junior Varsity basketball team at his school and Genera again made
Honor Roll and was elected senior class president. Keep up the good
work, everyone!
The Chester office staff honored our resource families in October
by having a Foster Parent Appreciation Dinner. The families were
served dinner prepared by the staff. Families received gift bags
and certificates for “Quality Care”. New Foundations
appreciates the hard work and dedication of all of our resource
families. The Chester office will also be giving out “best
report cards” awards. Winners will receive movie tickets or
certificates to Best Buy/Circuit City.
Upcoming Foster Parent Trainings
Chester office
January 25, 2006 – Developing Your Child’s Senses
February 25, 2006 – Building a Cohesive Family
March 25, 2006 – How to Communicate with Your Teenager
Center City
Training will resume in January. Dates and topics will be announced.
Recruitment
The recruitment staff has been busy over the last quarter.
In addition to approving eleven new resource families, the team
has been busy reaching out in various local communities. The team
welcomed Taren Daniels back from maternity leave in October. Kirsten
Hontz and Sandie Caulder attended the Southeast Regional SWAN meeting
in Philadelphia in September along with adoption coordinator Amy
Morris. Kirsten answered questions on foster care at the Arts &
Craft Fair in the Society Hill section of Philadelphia in September
and manned a table at a flea market at Old Swedes Church in October.
Shep Garner and Taren joined Program Director Shante Lee at the
Tri-State Mall in Delaware after Thanksgiving, providing information
on foster care and adoption to holiday shoppers.
Kirsten and foster parent Barbara Lewis attended the Pennsylvania
State Foster Parent Association conference in Grantville, PA on
October 20th and 21st . Kirsten reported that the workshops were
enjoyable as well as educational. It was Kirsten’s first attendance
at the conference while Barbara tries to attend every year. We are
hoping to send more of our foster parents next year. If any of our
resource parents are interested in attending future conferences,
please contact Sandie in the Chester office.
Services to Children in Their Own Homes (SCOH)
The New Foundations SCOH program continues working with our Philadelphia
area families. Two families have been successfully discharged this
quarter while we had five new referrals. Danielle Williams reports
that her staff was busy in September ensuring that all children
had school supplies and were prepared to begin the new school year.
SCOH case managers were able to provide Thanksgiving Baskets for
all their families. The baskets consisted of a full holiday dinner
and included a twenty pound turkey. All families were very appreciative
and some even cried because “they were not used to people
helping them the way we are helping”. Special thanks to Danielle
and the SCOH case managers: Omar Scruggs, Dante Adams, Nia Curtis
and Christiana Maddox for all their hard work over the holidays.
Adoption
We are pleased to share that New Foundations adoption staff has
successfully finalized five adoptions between September 1, 2005
and December 1, 2005. We would like to extend our congratulations
and ongoing support to the families who finalized their adoptions
to date.
We would like to welcome Jill Chiciak, who was hired as an Adoption
Coordinator in October, 2005.
Our Adoption Coordinators, Amy Morris and Jill Chiciak, attended
the SWAN Fall Quarterly Meeting in Philadelphia, Pa. on November
2, 2005. The theme for the event was “Independent Living.”
Amy attended the SWAN Southeast Regional Meeting on September 19,
2005. The topic was “Pennsylvania Adoption Exchange Later,”
which focused on ACT 160 and the Family Resource Registry. Jill
and Amy attended a Post-Adoption Forum sponsored by the Delaware
Valley Adoption Council on November 16, 2005 and the SWAN Southeast
Regional Meeting on December 6, 2005.
Amy and Jill also met with Elisa Esh, our Diakon-SWAN Technical
Assistant, for the quarterly site visit on 11/10/05. Ms. Esh commended
New Foundations staff for their commitment and enthusiasm in achieving
permanency through adoption for children and families.
New Foundations continues to complete Performance Based Contracting
(PBC) adoptions through Philadelphia county and SWAN adoptions and
Child Preparation through Delaware and the surrounding counties.
If you, or anyone you are connected with is interested in learning
more about adopting a child, please contact our adoption coordinator
at (215) 203-8733.
Aftercare
Aftercare Services are provided to children and families
who have achieved permanency through Reunification and Permanent
Legal Custodianship (PLC). Services are provided by New Foundations
Aftercare case managers for 12 months post permanency.
New Foundations Aftercare case managers, Lisa Naklicki and Kemi
Odeniyi, attended an Aftercare training in Philadelphia, Pa on 10/27/05.
The theme for the training was “Writing Effective Aftercare
Plans for Families Reuniting”. The training also focused on
encouraging all agencies involved with reuniting families to work
together to help make all Reunification and PLC cases a success.
New Foundations Aftercare program currently services 34 families.
Ten families have been successfully discharged from the Aftercare
Unit in the last quarter.
The Aftercare supervisor and case managers have demonstrated a
genuine commitment to empowering our children and families and have
provided excellent service during the last quarter.
DON’T FORGET…
Don’t forget that we are always looking for new foster parents
so we are better able to match the children coming into our care
with qualified and caring foster families. If you, or anyone you
are connected with is interested in learning more about foster parenting,
please contact our recruitment or case management staff at (215)
203-8733 or (610) 876-4474 or visit our website at www.nfi4kids.org.
Holiday Home Safety
Tis the season again. It is amazing how quickly a year can fly past.
Many of us love to decorate for the holiday season, but we must
be careful when doing so. There are a number of hazards in beautifying
our homes for the holidays.
One way to help ensure safety in the home is to make your Christmas
tree safe. The best way to ensure tree safety is to have an artificial
tree. They are safer and cleaner. They can also be used over and
over again. They will save money over time. If you really enjoy
having a real tree, there are some ways to make it safer. First,
make sure you keep the tree moist. It will drink about a gallon
of water every two days. Make sure you cut an inch off the bottom
of the tree trunk for better absorption of water. Next, make sure
that you keep your tree away from the fireplace or any space heater
you have in the home.
Another way to ensure safety in the home during the holidays is
to make sure your lights are safe. Never use real candles on a tree.
Only use UL-listed lights. You will find this label attached to
the light strand. Do not string more than three strands of lights
together. It is also better to use small lights that have cool burning
bulbs. Always turn off the lights on the tree when you are not at
home or if you are sleeping. It is also wise to discard lights after
one year of use. They are inexpensive and it will give you piece
of mind.
If you follow these simple, practical and easy safety tips, your
home and family can have a safe, happy and healthy holiday season.
For more safety tips you can visit the website where this information
was gathered . http://www.sosnet.com/safety/christmas.html
|
