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Center For Family Connections Newsletter
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Celebrating our 15th Anniversary!
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October, 2009
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Fun Ways to Support CFFC!
Sat. Oct. 17, 2009
At ALL Macy's stores nationwide!
Passes are $5 each--
You receive a 20% discount on almost all items, and CFFC keeps 100% of the proceeds from ticket sales!
Thurs. Oct 29. 2009
At Bloomingdale's in Chestnut Hill Mall
Newton, MA
Passes are $10 each-- You receive a 15% discount on almost all items, and CFFC keeps 100% of the proceeds from ticket sales, plus an extra $5 for every pass given back to the store during the event!
Both Macy's and Bloomindale's events will feature discounts, prizes, entertainment, and other excitement. Please purchase a ticket to these events and shop to support CFFC!
Email liannaf@kinnect.org
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Please register for one of our upcoming sessions for our International/ Transracial Post Adoption FaCT course, sponsored by a grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. The cost of each individual session is $55.
Training
during all eight sessions is facilitated by Dr. Joyce Maguire Pavao,
CFFC staff clinicians, or special guests and presenters.
Weds. October 21, 2009 8am-12pm:
Core Issues in International and Transracial Adoption-Therapeutic Strategies with Adoptive Triad Members
Weds. November 18, 2009 8am-12pm:
Attachment Pre and Post Adoption Issues for Birth and Adoptive Families
Sat. December 5, 2009 8am-4pm:
Trauma and Healing
Weds. January 13, 2010 8am-12pm:
Child Centered and Sensitive Treatment in Adoption
Weds. February 17, 2010 8am-12pm:
Clinical Practice with Diverse Children, Youth and Families in International and Transracial Adoptions
Weds. March 10, 2010 8am-12pm:
Search and Reunion Issues for International and Transracial Adoption Triad Members
Sat. April 10, 2010 8am-4pm:
Final Presentations and "Graduation"
Email cffc@kinnect.org for more information
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Quote of the Month
"No person who can read is ever successful at cleaning out an attic."
--Ann Landers
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View the trailer
for Roots: Unknown, a documentary about the "lifelong impact of adoption" by Zara Phillips, one of this year's Courage & Curiosity Awardees!
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Visit our website!.
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Letter from CFFC's CEO and Founder:
The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly...
I wish I could tell you that things at CFFC are fine and upbeat, but that is not the truth. CFFC applied for three federal grants and spent weeks and weeks working on these very carefully thought-out projects, only to be overlooked (we are awaiting the 'comments'.) No one in Massachusetts received any of the Children's Bureau grants, which is very disappointing--especially in this administration and with this level of need.
As we come into election time in our city, and in the state for Senator, I am more and more eager to hear of any mention of children and child issues. As far as I can tell, we do not have any champions of children left, let alone anyone who even seems to advocate for children these days.
· Do people not understand that a huge portion of our taxes and funds go to dealing with hospitalizations, prisons, residential centers and the like because we have not put enough care into providing the healing services needed by children and their families who have suffered trauma and loss?
· Do people not understand that these young people are the next adults who will run the State--or run it down?
· Why don't we see that in a time of economic downturn, more domestic violence, more addictions, more abuse and neglect take place, and more and more children are traumatized and left without services? We can prevent many problems by funding the resources to heal.
This is what we are cutting:
· We are cutting the future.
· We are cutting the right of a child to have his/her educational, psychological, emotional and social needs met.
· We are cutting the right of the parents who step in--be they birthparents who are trying to get their life back on track, relatives raising relative children, guardians, or foster parents--from getting the support and instruction that they need to help a child who has suffered trauma and loss to feel safe, sound, well, and happy.
I tell you all of this because we have more and more families calling CFFC every week. Their insurance pays very little toward operating CFFC. We have cut and cut and cut. We count paperclips. We have a small staff of full-time people, and all others are part-time and/or fee for service (independent contractors). We still do an incredible amount of pro bono work. We never turn people away because of lack of funds.
We have a wonderful new space for training and groups, but we haven't been able to furnish it or have computers and phones put in yet, so it isn't being utilized.
If anyone can offer us funding toward the new building and it's furnishings, it will help us to see more families and children in larger groups and trainings. We need more Apple Computers and furniture. (Also, we are having a hard time picking things up because it means not seeing at least 3 clients if we have to go to a town, pick up items, and return. It ends up being quite costly renting a truck and sending two people out).
If you have a computer or some good furniture, could you please arrange to drop it off for us? That would be so kind and would really be a triple donation!
Our auction is coming up. Courage and Curiosity is always a success. We usually make about $30k. This year, we truly need much more having lost 1/3 of our budget in State cuts. If you have sports tickets, restaurant gift certificates, a house in the Bahamas, a plane ticket--please contact Larisak@kinnect.org and she will gladly add it to our live and silent auction. Date for cut off is October 31.
Please come to the auction on November 10 at the Marlowe Hotel in Cambridge from 6 to 10. It is the night before a holiday! Come and do your holiday shopping and bring bidders!!! The awardees this year are: Darryl McDaniels of Run DMC and Zara Phillips (both adopted) and their latest single "I'm Legit;" Alison Larkin (also adopted); and Annette Baran. All are very deserving awardees.
We are pleased to report that the first session of our Kellogg International/Transracial Post Adoption course seemed to go extremely well. We have a total of 24 individuals signed up, with a fairly even split between professionals and adoptive parents/adopted individuals. And of the professionals, many are also personally connected to international/transracial adoption whether as adoptive parents or siblings, or by having been adopted internationally themselves.
After the session, we had all attendees also fill out an evaluation of the day. We will have continual evaluations after every session of the training throughout the year. Some of the highlights from the post-evaluations were:
What do you feel you have gained from the training?
· "Words can't express--connection, hope, info, containment"
· "More perspective on importance of discussing birth family and race in adoptive families"
· "Reaffirmed losses and challenges adopted kids face and the need to always keep conversation open and allow for grieving at different stages of child's life"
· "Through the examples used, group discussion, and film, a greater appreciation for the complexity of issues, the significance of the extended family, and roots"
What were some of the central ideas that you took from this presentation?
· "Adoption involves tragedy as well as joy"
· "Need for training professionals and families; need for support to families"
· "The necessity for allowing for and normalizing feelings of loss in adoption"
· "Adoption is a lifelong process"
· "Case study of one--to be careful not to overextend an idea"
· "What is shareable is bearable"
· "The validation of the relationship of all of the triad. Each family must be acknowledged and accepted"
· "The importance of greater or increased education across the spectrum of collaterals/providers of adoptive services"
What would you like added to this portion of the training for future courses?
· "Interested to hear other family therapy techniques and treatment strategies for adolescent groups, latent aged groups and parent groups"
· "Interested to discuss questions of protection/risk and how they relate to adoption and those stories"
From these initial responses, it seems as if the training has gotten off to a strong start! There was such an impressive influx of interest for this training that we had to create a waitlist, from which we would pull if we can continue to run this training annually. Also, we think it's important to note the wide-reaching nature of this training. Even though it's an eight-month commitment to some full and half-day trainings, we have people commuting from Maine, New Jersey, Connecticut and Vermont, in addition to those driving from all over the state of Massachusetts! These early signs indicate the incredible need for trainings like this, and we are proud to be working with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation to make them available.
In closing, I want to say that the children and families make all of this work worthwhile, and the staff at CFFC is an amazing group of very caring and hard-working individuals that come together as a team in the very best interest of children and families.
Happy Halloween--and maybe you could all dress up as philanthropists and make a large donation to Center For Family Connections!!
Sincerely,
Dr. Joyce Maguire Pavao
CEO and Founder
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UPCOMING EVENTS:
Center For Family Connections (CFFC)
Presents Our 8th Annual Courage and Curiosity Fundraiser:
Lost in Plain Sight
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
6:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Hotel Marlowe, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Silent and Live Auctions ... Award Ceremony ... Live Music ... Delicious Food ... Fabulous People ... and More!
Tickets $50 per person.
Please RSVP by October 30. 2009 to larisak@kinnect.org.
"My grandmother used to say 'children should be seen and not heard,' but in fact most children aren't heard at all. Their voices aren't valuable and they don't get votes or warrant attention in education, health, and mental health arenas. Many of the children we work with at CFFC are in the world of adoption and foster care because of abuse and neglect; all of them because of loss and disconnection. These children are neither seen nor heard. They are often invisible to the general public, legislators, judges, lawyers, and people in their own community. These children are lost in plain sight. Help us to get the funding and attention needed for the children we work with and exist for every day." - Dr. Joyce Maguire Pavao, CEO and Founder
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The Northeastern University Jewish Studies Program invites you to "Who Am I, Anyway? A Conversation about Race, Religion, and Adoption," with filmmaker Nicole Opper, director of the acclaimed documentary Off and Running, and Adam Pertman, author of Adoption Nation: How the Adoption Revolution is Transforming America and Executive Director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute.
Opper will show clips from her film about an African-American teen who was adopted and raised by a Jewish lesbian couple and then join Pertman in discussing how adoption is changing the face of American society and the Jewish community.
Sunday, October 25, 2009 at 2:30 p.m.
Congregation Kehillath Israel, 384 Harvard Street, Brookline, Mass
The event is free and open to the public.
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Letter from a supportive CFFC fan:
Joyce,
I'm so sorry to hear the news about the state & federal funding cuts... It still seems like the general public is so ignorant about the issues & realities surrounding adoption.... and it seems that the majority of those affected by adoption are still in the dark about resources like CFFC available (b/c it's hard for us to get media coverage when the media would rather talk about how great it is that celebrities are adopting, etc...)
...
Anyway, I'm a very green/new fundraising/development professional, so feel free to take my two cents with a grain of salt. =D I just wanted to send you a note of support, and to reiterate that I think the work that you have done and continue to do is SO important. Maybe a campaign could include some testimonials of people whose lives have been affected by you and CFFC? For example, I still remember wandering into your Cambridge office on a cold night in the fall of 2002, b/c you were having drop-in hours. It was so meaningful and amazing that there was this resource & space & someone who could really listen & understand the confusion I was experiencing (and still grapple with today!)!!! You gave me a lot of opportunities to work through a lot of really hard stuff, from participating in the pilot of the 'Zine project to being able to give a sound bite to The Today Show (that VHS tape is buried at my parents' house somewhere!). And on top of everything, you continually inspire me as a leader and pioneer in the field... even though I've only seen you a handful of times since I moved away from Boston, I still remember how important & influential my times with you were & how much you were able to open me up to ideas and networks to me that I'd never known.
Even though I don't have deep pockets, I hope in some small way this note will cheer you up! You have a big fan in me! =)
[From an adopted person]
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Breaking News: HHS Secretary Sebelius Announces Senate Confirmation of Carmen Nazario as Assistant Secretary for Children and Families
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced today that the United States Senate unanimously confirmed Carmen Nazario as Assistant Secretary for Children and Families. In that role, she will oversee the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) within HHS.
"Carmen Nazario has a distinguished record of more than 40 years working in human services at every level of government, as well as in the private and non-profit sectors," said Secretary Sebelius. "She has devoted her career to developing and implementing programs that promote the well-being of children and families, and she will build on that important work as Assistant Secretary for Children and Families."
Carmen Nazario's Bio:
Until her recent nomination, Carmen Nazario was an assistant professor at the Inter American University of Puerto Rico, where she taught social policy and coordinated the Social Work Practicum at the School of Social Work. Nazario has vast experience in public service with a focus on improving services to children and families within the United States and around the world, dating back to 1968. From January 2003 - December 2008, she served as administrator of the Administration for Children and Families for the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, where she led an agency of 4,000 staff with a budget of over $220 million. Prior to that, she served as the senior resident investigator for the Jordan Poverty Alleviation Program, where she developed and implemented a national poverty reduction strategy for the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and advised leaders in the nation on the delivery of social services. During the Clinton Administration, she first served as associate commissioner for Child Care in the Administration on Children, Youth and Families and later became the principal deputy assistant secretary at the Administration for Children and Families. Nazario joined the Clinton Administration after serving as Secretary of Health and Social Services for the State of Delaware from 1993-1997, and, prior to that, she was the director of Social Services in Norfolk, Virginia, and Loudon County, Va. Nazario has held a number of national leadership roles, including vice president of the Board of Directors of the American Public Welfare Association, president of the National Council of Local Public Welfare Administrators, and secretary of the National Council of State Human Service Administrators. Nazario is from Bayamon, Puerto Rico. She received a Bachelor of Arts with honors in Sociology from the University of Puerto Rico in 1967, and was awarded her Master of Social Work degree from Virginia Commonwealth University School of Social Work in 1973. |
CFFC is Xcited to announce our new group: Xprss Yourself!
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Center For Family Connections
350 Cambridge St. Cambridge, MA 02141
Phone: (617) 547-0909
Fax: (617) 497-5952
cffc@kinnect.org
www.kinnect.org
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