A meeting was held at the county 317 Board offices. In attendence were representatives from Athens Family and Children First Council, Meigs Family and Children First Council, Athens 317 Board, and YouthMOVE Ohio Council. The director of YouthMOVE Ohio joined in by phone to help clarify procedures and garner support for a YouthMOVE Athens County chapter.
Angela Lariviere, director for YouthMOVE Ohio, always suspected Athens was a plausible county to start a YouthMOVE chapter. She had even previously sent some funding to the 317 board in hopes that the opportunity would present itself. Once Jade joined the statewide YouthMOVE Ohio council in June 2018, it seemed that the opportunity had finally arrived. Jade has always had a drive for advocacy since she was young and has participated in a variety of movements and causes through the years. Now she found she could use her knowledge gained through lived experience to help others by working towards improving youth-serving systems of care. In addition, her mother, Beth, brought her own professional skill set as well as her own lived experience from the prospective of a parent navigating youth-serving systems. Part of her family's experiences included familiarity with Athens Family and Children First Council. Across the state, many established county YouthMOVEs were already using their county's FCFC to act as their lead agency. Therefore, it was logical for Angela to travel to Athens to meet with Jade, her mom and Wendy Shields, director of Athens FCFC, to begin the exploration phase of bringing a county YouthMOVE chapter to the area.
Photo: Angela Lariviere, YouthMove Ohio State Support Coordinator, welcomes Jade ____ onto the council.
Jade ____, a senior at Athens High School, was accepted onto the 15-member YouthMOVE Ohio council. YouthMOVE Ohio is a state chapter of YouthMOVE National. Jade is currently working on gathering support to start a local chapter. The state YouthMOVE Ohio council members have been collaborating with The Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (OhioMHAS) and the Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities (DoDD) in planning the Systems of Care (SOC): It’s About People Who Care Summit scheduled for September 14-15, 2018 in Columbus, OH. The goal of this summit is to support ongoing education, networking, and sharing of new and innovative best practices for Ohio’s children and families with behavioral health needs. The target audience for the summit includes public and private providers and administrators of children, youth, and young adult behavioral health (mental health and substance use), child welfare, physical health, juvenile justice, and education systems. Youth and families are at the heart of this summit and as such will be invited to participate in all aspects of the summit. The intent is to bring ideas, proposals, and collaborative partnerships from the summit into existing and new SOC action items, which will be included into state and regional behavioral health policy priorities. Jade will be a co-presenter at this conference. Jade and Donna Dickman, from Partnership for Violence Free Families, will be hosting the workshop, “Bullying & Gen Z: What are Our Kids Telling Us?” Scholarships for Youth AND Caregivers to attend the summit are available. It is easy to apply and these scholarships may include registration costs, hotel accommodations, and meals. The scholarships are being offered on a first come, first serve basis with determination by August 31st. The Ohio Interagency committee for Youth was created to provide cross systems collaboration with addressing issues that affect youth. This committe works together to identify opportunities for applying for grants, improving services, developing and implementing new programs and making the community aware about programs and services that can help transition age youth (12-26).
This committee has been led by staff from the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Recovery Services and includes partners from the following agencies:
In addtion, other community partners participate on the committee. These include: Youth and Family members with lived experience, National Alliance on Mental Illness Ohio, Ohio Citizen Advocates, Ohio Domestic Violence Network, YouthMOVE Ohio, Parent Advocacy Connection, and OSU Collegiate Recovery Cmmunity. Jade and her mother traveled to Columbus to attend this month's OICY meeting. Jade participated in a workgroup session regarding social media. Beth participated in a workgroup session regarding education. YouthMOVE Ohio is in the process of identifying parent and youth representatives to regularly participate in OICY to assist with youth and family voice initiatives. |
AuthorYouthMOVE Athens Archives
July 2020
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