NEVER be afraid to risk falling down... (Remember) The harder you fall the higher you bounce :-)
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INTERESTING ARTICLES
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October 2008-
President Bush signed the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008
This historic legislation makes the most significant changes and improvements in the child welfare system in more than a decade. This new law, once fully implemented, will provide increased incentives for states to place waiting children for adoption, expanded federal support for permanency options for youth in foster care, more direct federal support for children being served by tribal child welfare systems, increased emphasis on family connections for youth in foster care, federal support for training an expanded population of workers and partners in the child welfare system, and many other improvements.
This legislation was developed through extraordinary bi-partisan and bi-cameral work, thanks to the significant leadership from Senators Max Baucus (D-MT), Charles Grassley (R-IA), and Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), and Representatives Jim McDermott (D-WA) and Jerry Weller (R-IL). Thanks also to all of the advocates who have worked for years to bring these improvements to the child welfare system!
The Children's Defense Fund and the Center for Law and Social Policy have developed helpful resources that detail the provisions of this new law. The resources are available online.
Click Here.
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Older Children & Adoption
How It
Feels To Be Adopted
Jill Krementz
Nineteen youngsters present both the good and the bad sides about
being adopted from an adolescent point of view.
A Child's
Journey Through Placement
Vera I. Fahlberg, M.D.
Provides the foundation, resources, and tools to help professional
and parents support these children, victims of broken attachments,
on their way to adulthood.
Helping
Children Cope With Separation And Loss
Claudia L. Jewett-Jarratt
Contains compassionate, step-by-step guidance for any concerned adult
who wants to help a child talk about, cope with, and recover from
a loss.
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Dear Friends!
We at CFFC are Thankful for all of the dedicated people who work with us to provide specialized services to children and all of their families.
We are Thankful for the dedicated people who donate time, money, and who make referrals to us.
We are Thankful for a Board and Advisory Board who are responsible and invested in the life of CFFC.
We are Thankful for a staff of wonderful Clinical people, who care above and beyond for their clients and their work and who keep learning more in order to give more.
We are Thankful for a staff of wonderful Operations people, who endorse the mission and who provide the foundation on which we can build and support strong and healthy families.
We are Thankful for all of the help to fill in for the huge budget cuts that we have tolerated this Fall. Please keep on helping us to close those gaps!
We are still perplexed about how the Governor and Commissioner can cut the line item "Children and Families" when the title of the Service is the Department of Children and Families. But, we are grateful that we still have SOME funding to do our important work for this under served population.
We are Thankful for the Children and Families who are working hard every day to deal with challenges and to experience the joy of Family.
We wish you a wonderful Thanksgiving!
Dr. Joyce Maguire Pavao, CEO and Founder
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Call 617.547.0909 to Register NOW and Click Here for more information
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As part of CFFC's Celebration, we are proud to announce a call for
photos! These photos will be incorporated into our education of the
larger community to embrace and understand adoptive families, birth
families and adopted people (we include - as you know - foster
families, and other blended families through divorce and remarriage and
through alternative reproductive technologies as well).
This effort is called We are Family! and is meant to show the world that there are many versions of a 'real' family and all must be honored and celebrated.
The photo collection is intended to show the many types of families. There
are seven categories of entry: 1. Intercountry adoption; 2. domestic
adoption; 3. foster-adoption; 4. kinship care; 5. family preservation (birth
families); 6. siblings; and 7. birthdays.
CFFC began accepting photos prior to National Adoption month and will continue through December 31st.
Photos will be featured at ACTION - our International Conference on Post Adoption Services February 23-25th.
So,
get out your cameras and send us your favorite photos old old old or
new new new. Families are forever and what came before is as important
as what is happening now.
For more information please contact us at, 617.547.0909. |
coming up...
Family Connections Training (Fa.C.T.) Institute
Understanding Trauma and its Role in Attachment Disorders
January 28, 2009
9am-12pm; $55 per person
This is a workshop to help workers and parents understand why children have behaviors they do and what kinds of treatments might be best considered. This is necessary for anyone working or living with children who have suffered trauma.
Please call 617.547.0909 to register
OR email cffc@kinnect.org
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8 Free spots for DCF employees
DCF employees Please register on PACE
password: CFFC |
| Click Here for a list of this years FaCT Trainings |
Information from our Friends
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Hello!
We hope you are doing well and staying warm as the temperature drops...
Our new website is up and running and we will be featuring a different recipient agency every other month to help drive traffic and awareness to your agencies and to keep our content fresh. Linking websites is a great way for both parties to rise in the search engine rankings. We're hoping that those of you who have websites would be willing to link The Art Connection as well (if you have not done so already).
To make it easy, we have attached our logo for your uploading ease. Click here.
If you can let us know when/if you link us we'd love to keep track of it.... Thanks!
-The Art Connection
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Global Overseas Adoptees' Link (G.O.A.'L), in cooperation with the Overseas Koreans Foundation (OKF)
is excited to announce an opportunity for adoptees who wish to search for their birth families and visit Korea this winter.
"First Trip Home" 2008 Birth Family Search Tour to Korea for Overseas Adopted Koreans
will take place December 8-14, 2008.
One of the biggest benefits of this trip is that it will provide adoptees, whom have experienced various challenges (including financial) in being able to visit Korea or search for birth family previously, a rare opportunity to come to Korea, make important connections and engage in search. Air fare and accommodations will be provided by OKF.
As facilitator of First Trip Home, do not hesitate to let us at G.O.A.'L know (firsttriphome@gmail.com <mailto:firsttriphome%40gmail.com> ) about your special needs or questions prior to your arrival. As adoptees who founded and have been running G.O.A.'L over the past ten years, we are fully prepared to support all applicants and participants of First Trip Home.
Click Here for more Program information.
Click Here for the Application Form
If, for any reason, you have trouble downloading the forms via the links above, please visit OKF (oaks.korean.net) or G.O.A.'L (www.goal.or.kr/eng) to access the forms directly.
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ATTORNEY'S ADVICE - NO CHARGE
A corporate Attorney sent the following out to the employees in his company.
1. Do not sign the back of your credit cards. Instead, put ' ID REQUIRED.'
2. When you are writing checks to pay on your credit card Accounts, DO NOT put the complete account number on the 'For' line. Instead, just put the last four numbers. The credit card company knows the rest of the number, and anyone who might be handling your check as it passes through all the check processing channels won't have access to it.
3. Put your work phone # on your checks instead of your home Phone. If you have a PO Box use that instead of your home address. If you do not have a PO Box, use your work address. Never have your SS# printed on your checks. You can add it if it is necessary. But if you have it printed, anyone can get it.
4. Place the contents of your wallet on a photocopy machine. Do both sides of each license, credit card, etc. You will know what you had in your wallet and all of the account numbers and phone numbers to Call and cancel. Keep the photocopy in a safe place. I also carry a Photocopy of my passport when I travel either here or abroad. We've all heard horror stories about fraud that's committed on us in stealing a Name, address, Social Security number, credit cards.
Unfortunately, I, an attorney, have firsthand knowledge because my wallet was stolen last month. Within a week, the thieve(s) ordered an expensive monthly cell phone package, applied for a VISA credit card, had a credit line approved to buy a Gateway computer, received a PIN number from DMV to change my driving record information online, and more. But here's some critical information to limit the damage in case this happens to you or someone you know:
5. We have been told we should cancel our credit cards immediately. But the key is having the toll free numbers and your card Numbers handy so you know whom to call. Keep those where you can find them.
6. File a police report immediately in the jurisdiction where your credit cards, etc., were stolen. This proves to credit providers you were diligent, and this is a first step toward an Investigation (if there ever is one).
But here's what is perhaps most important of all: (I never even thought to do this.)
7. Call the 3 national credit reporting organizations immediately to place a fraud alert on your name and also call the Social Security fraud line number. I had never heard of doing that until advised by a bank that called to tell me an application for credit was made over the internet in my name. The alert means any company that checks your credit knows your information was stolen, and they have to contact you by phone to authorize new credit.
By the time I was advised to do this, almost two weeks after the theft, all the damage had been done. There are records of all the credit checks initiated by the thieves' purchases, none of which I knew about before placing the alert. Since then, no additional damage has been done, and the thieves threw my wallet away this weekend (someone turned it in) It seems to have stopped them dead in their tracks.
Now, here are the numbers you always need to contact about your wallet, etc., if lost or stolen:
1.) Equifax: 800.525.6285
2.) Experian (formerly TRW): 888.397.3742
3.) Trans Union : 800.680.7289
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 Please contact us with any questions or comments.
Center For Family Connections
350 Cambridge Street
Cambridge, MA 02141
p. 617.547.0909
f. 617.497.5952
cffc@kinnect.org
Office Hours:
Monday- Thursday: 9am-8pm
Friday: 9am-5pm
Sincerely,
The CFFC Team
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