Programs: Prevention and early intervention: the great beginnings program provides prevention, early intervention and treatment to children and their family ages prenatal - 7 to reduce vulnerabilities and increase protective factors. Families are eligible if there are risk factors for child maltreatment, where the child has a mental health diagnosis, has been exposed to trauma, or displays challenging behavior in the home or at school. Service is delivered in the home, preschool, family resource centers or at calm. Specific programs run through great beginnings include:child parent program uses evidence based therapies which include dyadic models and play therapy techniques to promote bonding and attachment in the early years. This program helps children and their caregivers recover from trauma or abuse. (296 children served)prevention and early intervention - utilizing the healthy families america model, provides home visitation services to foster protective factors in the child and family by providing education on positive parenting practices, developmental guidance, and assessment. The program also provides assistance and advocacy in accessing programs to assist with basic needs, healthcare, childcare, or housing. (180 families served)safecare - an evidence-based parent education curriculum delivered in the home. Parents receive three educational modules: home safety, child health and parent-child interaction which works to ameliorate child neglect and physical abuse of children. (67 parents served)preventing child abuse through family strengthening is a community collaboration between calm and the family resource center network and early care and education providers to provide a continuum of targeted services to prevent child abuse and neglect, provide treatment and family case management services. (426 individuals served collaboratively)mental health consultation and reflective supervision is a capacity building and problem solving intervention implemented in early childhood settings. Our reflective practitioners develop a collaborative and reflective relationship with teachers and caregivers in order to enable them to better serve the children in their programs. (600 children and their teachers benefitted)postpartum support postpartum depression, when untreated, can adversely affect the maternal-child bond and impact child development. Calm provides groups and individual support to help mothers with postpartum depression attend to their childrens emotional needs and build strong parent child bonds. Approximately 40% of our mothers are struggling with postpartum depression. Katie a mental health screenings are an adjunct service under our great beginnings program. We provide mental health screenings and treatment recommendations for children 0-5 years immediately after they enter foster care or the child welfare service voluntary family maintenance program. (127 children were given bio-psycho-social assessments)the welcome every baby (web) newborn home visiting program is a free community service for newborns with risk factors and their families who live in santa maria and guadalupe. The program starts with a universal visit by a registered nurse from marian regional medical center, who then can make a referral to one of calms bilingual (including one who is trilingual and speaks mixteco) infant home visitors for families who have risk factors and are interested in web visits. Many referrals for this program are submitted via dignity health, but the program can also accept community and/or self-referrals. The infant home visitors can make up to five visits in home for infants (newborn to 18 months) to assist with such issues as breastfeeding (all are certified lactation consultants), nutrition, sleep problems, crying and tantrums, and child development issues (with use of asq-3 screening tool). (695 new parents were served in santa maria and guadalupe)
intensive community based treatment: tthe whatever it takes (wit) team provides intensive therapeutic interventions to children and families across all of santa barbara county. The wit program serves children who need the highest level of care. These clients include children who are severely emotionally disturbed or mentally ill, children in foster care and children who are impacted by parent addiction. Therapists devote from 3 to 15 hours per client per week. A total of 424 clients were seen in the wit program. Specific programs include:intensive in-home therapy provides treatment to children struggling in home, school and in the community. These are children with emotional disturbances or mental illness who put themselves and at times others at risk. Many of these clients have trauma histories. Work includes therapy, skill building and support of the client in the other agencies in which the client is involved. Helping others in parenting environments (hope) was developed in recognition of the trauma experienced by children who enter the foster care system. Hope is an array of intensive in-home services available to children and parents in foster home and extended family home placements. The hope program combines skill-based intervention with maximum flexibility so that services are available to families and foster homes according to their unique needs. (215 clients received treatment in the iih and hope programs)family treatment drug court and fresh start (families in recovery embracing sobriety and health) are two programs to help children and families impacted by parental addiction. Therapists provide trauma informed services to women and children living in residential treatment at good samaritan shelters in lompoc and santa maria. Their children who are in foster care, fathers, and significant others are also engaged in individual, family and group treatment. The programs strengthen the capacity and ability of parents and care providers to provide a nurturing, stable home for their children. This is an extended service to support the children and families through graduation from family drug court to family reunification. (73 children and parents received services)spirit is a family centered, community oriented, highly individualized, wrap around strategy, available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, designed to help families facing serious challenges find solutions to keep children and teens safely in their home, be successful in school and function well in the community. (75 children and their families served)
treatment on-site at calm: includes all kinds of treatment and prevention for children and families. Children who have witnessed violence in their homes and children who have experienced sexual or physical abuse are treated on-site in santa barbara, carpinteria, lompoc and santa maria. Additional, calm on-site therapists work to educate parents, teachers and children about abuse in school, community centers and homes. 857 children and parents were served in our on-site treatment programs in fy 2015. On-site treatment programs include:therapeutic treatment: evidence based practices are used in treating children who have experienced abuse or family violence. Children who have been sexually abused, physically abused or neglected benefit from trauma focused cognitive behavior therapy. Teens who are exhibiting self-destructive behavior benefit from dialectic behavior therapy groups. Family violence program: uses both evidence based and promising practices to serve children and their non-offending parents in healing from the trauma of domestic violence. Front porch: front porch is designed to help families about whom there is concern leading to a referral to child welfare services but who do not meet the criteria for opening a child welfare case. The front porch engagement specialist contacts these families, helps them identify which services might be helpful to them and then connects them to those services. This program is so successful that last year a second referral of such families to child welfare services fell from a previous rate of 30% to 5%. (507 referrals received)forensic interviews: at the request of law enforcement or child welfare services, calm interviews children when there is an allegation of child sexual or physical abuse. Calm is the only agency in santa barbara county providing this critically important service that is unpredictable, yet urgent. (120 interviews conducted in santa maria, lompoc and santa barbara)school based prevention: calm provides education to children, teachers and caregivers about body safety. In fy 2014, calm provided 279 presentations and reached more than 5,000 children, teachers and caregivers in both santa barbara and santa maria. Calm also provided 7 mandated reporter trainings that reached 350 teachers, coaches and camp counselors. Parenting programs: calm provides a variety of programs to parents to improve their parenting practices. These include therapeutic group and individual services to parents affected by their own histories of abuse, parent-child interaction therapy for parents with their children who have demonstrated seriously challenging behavior, and educational programs using the incredible years and the nurturing parenting curriculum. Heal: group services to adults affected by a childhood history of sexual abuse. (20 adults who were abused as children participated).
