The spread of our positive behavioral and proactive management philosophy and approach.

1 Interest in our highly effective proactive philosophy and positive approach continues to grow. On Thursday the 20th we hosted four visitors from the Saratoga County ARC. The visitors included their Executive Director and three members of her executive team. All experienced professional and all very impressed with what they experienced.

When such visitors come to Delarc we don't do the typical tour. Rather they are expected to be here by 8:30 a.m. and to spend their day in our Vantage Point (VP) program. We invented VP in 1992 and since then every new employee spends their first dau of employment as a consumer of services. During the course of the day they are involved in a series of role play experiences that place them in the shoes (or wheelchair) of a person with disabilities and which teach them things new employees want to learn; like the names of their new co-workers.

By 3:00 they have had the experience of a lifetime. Something they will long remember and we hope they never forget. The folks from Saratoga left with a lot to talk about on the drive home and even more to think about as they, like the rest of us, strive to improve the quality of their services and supports.

2 Just before I met with the folks from Saratoga at 3:15 I picked up a phone message asking me to check my email. It was from the state of Georgia and contained a contract to deliver a second year of consulting and training to providers there. During ’08 we have mentored six different agencies for people with disabilities in Atlanta, Breeman, Athens, Augusta, Waycross and Lithonia.

The ’09 contract is to continue that work while adding three more agencies.

3 On December 3 we will have two folks visiting from the Yates County ARC. Their Executive Director and Chief Psychologist visited a couple of months ago and as they build momentum for change they want more of their employees to experience, first hand, our unique philosophy and approach.

4 We are currently developing plans to conduct several Executive 2 day introductory sessions across New York State. They will be sponsored by the NYSARC Executive Directors Association and should be launched in January or February. These Execs and their teams will learn about our Shift Happens and People power Models of Excellence.
I’m quite certain at least several of them will want additional help moving forward.

Stay tuned for further updates.

Recruitment and Training

Yesterday I conducted the last of four training sessions with Delarc supervisors. There were two groups and each group participated in two four hour sessions. It had been a few years since this training was offered so the groups contained both fairly new and some well experienced supervisors.

Both groups impressed me in many ways including:

1 All the bright eyes. I didn’t notice one “dud” in the lot. Every single person, 35 in total, actively participated. At one time or another, every single person asked questions, offered opinions and contributed important insights. People were alert and stayed alert.

2 Eager learners. The purpose of the training was to impress upon them the critical importance of their jobs and to increase their mindfulness of key issues. Issues which I need to count on them to continually address in order for our organization to maximize employee productivity and retention; which in turn will lead to the satisfaction of the people we serve and their families and in the longer run accomplish our mission.

At the conclusion of the sessions I was convinced that each person left the room having learned important information, gained important insights and increased the mindfulness we were looking for. They came in with the right mind set and left better equipped and motivated to provide world class levels of coaching and support to our world class staff.

3 The benefit of proper recruitment. This lesson continues to shine through in so many ways. There were several times during the sessions when I couldn’t help think of prior training sessions we have conducted with many different audiences across the country. While there were always bright and motivated people in attendance and while, with humility, I can say there were other, more borderline performers we were able to captivate and bring around, all too frequently there were people in the audience who quite clearly didn’t belong there. In too many cases, they outnumbered those that did belong.

Our emphasis on proper recruitment and selection pays off in so many ways. The caliber of those 35 supervisors proves it once again.

4 The children and adults we support come first. This principle is so simple; yet, so profound. Easy to say; extremely difficult to actualize. It is the bottom line of this organization. The key to that actualization is the partnership between our staff and the people who coach and support them.

I slept well last night (at least until 3:00 when I started thinking about the day ahead) knowing that partnership will be even stronger.

Geraldo Rivera Takes on the Waiting List Crisis!

January 6, 2009 hour-long news special to focus on the emerging crisis for people with intellectual disabilities and their families.

Visibly moved by comments from self-advocates, family members and chapter leaders at the Opening Plenary Session of The Arc's 2008 National Convention, renowned television journalist, Geraldo Rivera, electrified the audience, pledging that on January 6, 2009 - the anniversary of his expose about Willowbrook - he will present a one-hour news special to shine light on the current crisis facing people with disabilities and their families - the Waiting List.

While in Delaware County our waiting list is short, most parts of the country are experiencing long severe waits. It is not at all uncommon for parents in their eighties to still be caring for their adult child in their homes. These parents have been heard to say they can’t die since there will be no one to care for their child.

The Arc US has long advocated for a national response to the waiting list crisis. With Geraldo’s help perhaps the message will get through and states will be moved to act to end these terribly long waits that all too many families are enduring. Look for the special on January 6.

GOVERNANCE

At The Arc US annual convention on November 6, I attended a session on nonprofit governance which reinforced and supported the work of our Board of Directors.

Entitled “Tools for Excellence” which was conducted by The Arc US Executive Director, Peter Berns and Steve Morgan, Executive Director of The Arc of Baltimore, the session explored important issues and trends facing organizations like ours.

It introduced a tool developed by the Maryland Association of Nonprofit Organizations called Standards for Excellence: An Ethics and Accountability Code for the Nonprofit Sector. The tool promotes the highest standards of ethics and accountability in nonprofit governance, management and operations.

The thing that attracted me to the session was that some time ago we became aware of the standards and our Board had already determined to use them as it reviews our Board policies. This was the first training session available on their use and I came away very pleased and confident our Board meets most of the standards and especially, the most critical ones.

For more information on the Standards for Excellence, please go to www.standardsforexcellenceinstitute.org or give me a call if that is preferred.

The Shift is Happening in New York!

At its meeting of October 14th, 2008, the Executive Directors' Association (EDA), a partnership of executive directors of NYSARC Chapters, voted unanimously to have The Arc of Delaware County conduct a series of two day Shift Happens training sessions introducing an alternative to the use of restraints and physical interventions. These trainings will be conducted in various regions throughout New York State, enabling all NYSARC Chapters to participate and hear more about this best practice.

For those unfamiliar with EDA, it is a professional leadership organization that promotes excellence and professional leadership in support of the NYSARC mission, encourages growth and development of quality services for people with disabilities, influences public policy, develops innovations in service delivery, and provides professional participation to the governing structure of NYSARC, Inc. The EDA commits itself to the promotion and maintenance of the highest ethical standards, and Delarc is excited to be part of helping NYSARC chapters make the shift to a non-aversive, proactive approach.

Check back soon for details on how the shift is happening in New York!

Training

The Challenge of the Challenge

Our first publication, welcome to the Challenge of the Delaware County ARC was written in 1992 and has been a big hit within our organization and with many folks across the country. It has sold out and been reprinted several times. Earlier this year as we were preparing for another reprint we decided we needed to do more than simply reprint it.

Since 1992 many changes have occurred in our field and in our organization and these needed to be included in The Challenge. Since then we have written one other book, Shift Happens…Making The Arc of Delaware County Shift to Proactive Behavior Management and a monograph, Vantage Point, a Dynamic approach to Employee Orientation. These needed to be referred to in The new Challenge because it is the first book our employees read.

In terms of changes in the field like the term Intellectual Disability vs. Mental Retardation, and the concept of person centeredness were not around in 1992. They too needed to be included in the new publication.

Using The Challenge

It took several months to complete the rewrite and printing. When it was delivered our first instinct was to give every staff member a copy. Our fear though was two fold. First we did not want to hand it out and have it sit on shelves. It is an important read. Secondly we wanted to make sure our leaders were well aware of the changes so they could refer to it, be able to answer questions about it and determine how best to introduce it to their existing staff who have all read the original.

So we have held off on distributing to staff while our leaders read it, let me know what they think of it, ask any questions they may have and finally determine how they will use it in their departments. That is currently underway. Once I hear form them and they are prepared, books will be distributed to all existing employees. In terms of new employees, we will keep our practice of having them read The Challenge within their first week of employment.

Obtaining copies

The Challenge of Caring Without Restraint is now available for purchase through our web sites: www.delarc.org or www.shifthappens.tv . Get your copy today.

Happy reading!

The Arc of Delaware County featured in a revolutionary new book.

TITLE: “For Our Own Safety, Examining the Safety of High-Risk Interventions for Children and Young People” Edited by Michael A. Nunno, David M. Day and Lloyd B. Bullard.

DATE OF RELEASE: July 2008.

BACKGROUND: During June 1-4, 2005, George Suess, CEO, represented The Arc of Delaware County (Delarc), at the first international symposium of its kind, entitled “Examining the Safety of High-Risk Interventions for Children and Young People. The symposium took place at Cornell University. It was cosponsored by Cornell’s Family Life Development Center, Stirling University, Stirling, Scotland and the Child welfare League of America.

For Our Own Safety is devoted entirely to the subject of, and risks associated with, restraint and seclusion of children. This book is a collection of the diverse viewpoints presented at the international symposium, Examining the Safety of High-Risk Interventions for Children and Young People. It presents frank examination of the legal, ethical, and historical uses of physical restraints and seclusion. Also addressed in this collection are issues of safety, the psychological and emotional impacts of restraint, guidelines for development and use, as well as clinical and organizational strategies likely to reduce use. SUMMARY: Intended for use by professionals who want to address the impact of aggression and violence, this volume contributes to the discussion of the appropriate use of high-risk interventions and the ways to improve the general quality services and supports through safe and harm-free environments.

Subsequently, the book described below was born from the papers and presentations from the symposium. Delarc was urged to develop a chapter on the use of restraints as a leadership and cultural matter, which it did.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I: YOUNG PEOPLE AND PHYSICAL RESTRAINTS
Chapter 1: Young People's Experiences of Physical Restraint in Residential Care: Subtlety and Complexity in Policy and Practice

PART II: THEORETICAL AND HISTORICAL ISSUES
Chapter 2: Literature on the Therapeutic Effectiveness of Physical Restraints with Children and Youth
Chapter 3: Modernizing Seclusion and Restraint

PART III: ENSURING SAFETY AND MANAGING RISK
Chapter 4: Physical Restraints: Are They Ever Safe and How Safe Is Safe Enough?
Chapter 5: Risk and Prone Restraint: Reviewing the Evidence
Chapter 6: Learning from the Research

PART IV: REDUCING RESTRAINTS THROUGH ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE
Chapter 7: Adopting a Public Health Model to Reduce Violence and Restraints in Children's Residential Care Facilities
Chapter 8: Leadership's and Program’s Role in Organizational and Cultural Change to Reduce Seclusions and Restraints
Chapter 9: A Case Study Organizational Intervention to Reduce Physical Interventions: Creating Effective, Harm-Free EnvironmentsChapter
10: Beyond a Crisis Management Program: How We Reduced Our Restraints by Half in One Year
Chapter 11: Reducing the Use of Seclusion and Restraint in a Day School Program
Chapter 12: Lessons Learned from 30 Plus Years of No Physical Intervention

PART V: LEGAL ISSUES
Chapter 13: Using Restraint: The Legal Context of High-Risk Interventions
Chapter 14: The Reach of Liability for Restraints: A Question of Professional Judgment

PART VI: CONCLUSION
Chapter 15: Moving Forward

ORDERING AND INFORMATION: For information, including purchasing information please go to the Child welfare League of America web www.cwla.org