Amie helps Darienne find happiness in life; you can make a difference as a mentor, too
January is National Mentoring Month and there are so many young people who need positive adult influences in their lives. For a good example of the difference a mentor can make, watch this story from Atlanta’s FOX 5 news about Darienne and her mentor, Amie.
To learn more about mentoring through Youth Villages, visit youthvillages.org.
New England families offer thanks to their Holiday Heroes
Thanks to the generosity of Youth Villages’ supporters in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, more than 290 children received gifts during the 2011 holiday season through the Holiday Heroes program. The gallery below contains thank-you notes from some of those children and their families. In addition, please read the moving letters below from three Youth Villages in-home staff members about the impact Holiday Heroes made with families they serve…
Chelsea Coffman’s Letter
I wanted to seize the opportunity to thank you for your generosity this holiday season. I have difficulty putting my gratitude into words, and I can assure you that however thankful I am, the families I work with are even more thankful.
I nominated three families for the Holiday Heroes program this year and all three families were sponsored. This was very good news, and it was wonderful to see parents’ eyes light up when I told them that there would be some gifts for their children. Nevertheless, I worried that there would not be enough gifts to go around since two of the three families had multiple children. I could sense this same worry in the parents – what kind of Christmas magic would exist for their children this year?
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Youth Villages Suggests Putting Family Time On The Calendar
Larry Lam, clinical supervisor with Youth Villages in Greensboro, N.C., recently appeared on WFMY News 2 to talk about practical ways of making family time with your children a priority. Watch the entire interview at digtriad.com.
Holiday Heroes bring joy to children in North Carolina
Volunteers and donors throughout North Carolina brought some holiday cheer to Youth Villages children this season. From toy drives to wrapping parties, we appreciate all of the Holiday Heroes who joined in the fun. Above are some photos of our generous Holiday Heroes in North Carolina.
Bartlett Campus kids take flight to North Pole
Boys from the Bartlett Campus recently hopped a Delta flight to the North Pole for a visit with Santa Claus!
Each year Delta Airlines invites children from local nonprofit organizations to enjoy a “flight” to the North Pole. This year, kids from Youth Villages, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and the Ronald McDonald House all boarded the flight. Several local mascots also made the journey with the kids including Sheldon of the Memphis Riverkings, Rockey the Redbird and the Chik-fil-a Cow, all dressed up for Christmas!
The special guests enjoyed snacks and sang carols while the fantasy flight headed to the North Pole. As their “sleigh” reached the gate, the kids were allowed to open the window shades in time to see Santa waiting on the tarmac for them. Once inside the North Pole gate, they were treated to milk and cookies, face painting and a balloon artist.
Youth Villages expands to Indiana; Madison office opens to help children and families
Youth Villages, a national leader in children’s mental and behavioral health services, has begun helping children and families in Indiana, opening its first office in Madison on Dec. 16.
The private nonprofit organization is partnering with the Indiana Department of Child Services to provide intensive help to troubled children and their families in their own homes.
Youth Villages’ goal is to stabilize and strengthen families. This prevents at-risk children from entering foster care or institutions and helps successfully reunify children with their families if out-of-home placement has been needed.
Youth Villages uses the Evidentiary Family Restoration™ approach, which focuses on providing intensive help to both the child and family in the home and offering measurable positive outcomes and accountability to both families and funders.
“Youth Villages is an organization that is all about family,” said Heather Owsley, regional manager of the Youth Villages intensive in-home services program in Indiana. “At Youth Villages, we believe children are best raised by their families or a viable family member. Our staff works hard to strengthen families and provide them with the tools and skills they need to effectively parent children with emotional, behavioral and mental health issues and to prevent or reduce the time a child spends out of the home for treatment.”
Youth/Teen Depression During The Holidays
Sierra Kehoe with Youth Villages stopped by the WFMY Good Morning Show (Greensboro, NC) to talk about the signs of depression.
More than 150 guests showed their support for Youth Villages at our Dec. 5 Holiday Heroes Gift Drive at The Vault in Boston. The event generated more than $2,800 and 100 in-kind gifts to help us fulfill the holiday wishes of more than 290 children and families in our programs!
Bartlett’s Cottage One recycles
Young people from Cottage 1, back row, left to right, include Greg, Joseph, Christopher, Cornelius and Corey. Front row are Josh, Brandon, Tristan and Nathan.
Kaitlin Kennedy, a teacher counselor at Youth Villages’ Bartlett Campus, introduced recycling to Cottage 1 as a way to teach a life skill.
But the youth owned it after that first trip to the Bartlett Recycling Center. The group now visits the center twice a month, and has expanded what they do to the Bartlett Campus.
“They really enjoy it,” said Mary Morris, counselor at Youth Villages’ Bartlett Campus. “As the months have passed, they continue to learn more about recycling and have turned it into their own project.”
The youth conduct campus clean-ups daily and separate the trash for recycling.
They’re planning to start a recycling program for all the cottages on the campus by installing recycling containers at each one.
“It’s great to see how the youth have taken this on and made it into their project,” Morris said.
Davis has a knack for investigating, finding families
Andrea Davis' experience as a counselor has helped when speaking with family members when she’s locating supports for youth who’ve been in state custody.
Some of them are easy. Maybe a simple online search or connecting through Facebook brings out family members of a child who has been in state custody for some time.
But many of them aren’t easy, and involve exhaustive investigation, countless phone calls and interviews with family acquaintances.
Andrea Davis makes calls and investigates – an uncle out-of-state, interviews with former foster families, searching online databases – to complete a puzzle for each young person, to find forgotten family. Many of the youth have spent years in state custody. Through terminated parental rights, stays at numerous foster and group homes and changing names, many young people in Youth Villages’ programs for extended periods of time don’t know if they have any family. They can’t tell you where any of their family members are. In many cases, the youth have simply fallen victim to a system that protected them.
Andrea takes on these cases and finds family for these youth. She has a knack for getting information, acting on even the most remote clues to identify aunts, cousins and other family members, many of whom are more than willing to take in or be a support for the young people. It’s not a job for someone who quits easily.
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