STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
Page 1
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
January 15, 2015
10:00 a.m. CT
Operator: This meeting is now being recorded.
(Marjorie Roueche): Good morning, everybody. His is (Marjorie) here at the Central Office. I wanted to
let you know we have a -- sort of rearrange in our schedule. We can start with the upcoming
events and activities just to get Dr. (Hall), is here for a bit, but we're going to lose her to another
meeting.
(Hall): So, good morning, everybody, and thanks for being on the conference call today. There were a
couple of things that we wanted to share with everybody. The first is everyone is aware the
legislative session started on Tuesday.
I think as of yesterday they had a little under 1,000 bills that have been filed so far. Right now,
there are none we are following that really would impact the work that our contractors are doing,
but just be aware that we will keep you guys updated through the course of the session, and if
there's something that you'll need to be made aware of, we'll make sure that that gets relayed to
you guys.
The other thing I wanted to do was to thank the contractors who've been helping us in recruiting
families for our focus groups. So, as all of you are aware, we're in the midst of our Title V needs
assessment. We had already had our -- surveys have gone out to the families. We had done the
provider focus groups, and now we're in the process of doing the family focus groups. And those
actually kicked off on Tuesday and they will finish up next week.
I'd like to thank you all as a whole, and then those who have individually, when we reached out,
who have helped us in making sure that we have our families represented at these -- at these
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
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groups, it's very helpful to us as a program to have that feedback, and that information. And the
results of this needs assessment is what's going to be setting -- helping us set our priorities for
the next five years. So, thank you very much for that.
(Marjorie Roueche): Does anybody else have any upcoming events or activities they wanted to share
with the group?
(Laura): This is (Laura), at Texas ((inaudible)). We have a parents conference happening in Fort Worth
on February 21st. It's a one-day free conference. I think there's 20 breakout sessions and a
couple of keynote speakers. And then child care is available. Spanish is available if you register
and ask for it early. And there's a flyer on our website.
Female: And, (Laura), also, can you give the dates of the conference in June at (San Marcus)?
(Laura): Yes. It's June 12th and 13th.
Female: Okay, thank you.
(Laura): And I believe we're doing a mental health leadership group with the systems of care (families
voice) netork on Thursday the 11th. So, I'll get information out on that one as we get it more
planned.
Female: It sounds great. Thank you. And then just -- to kind of to mark your calendars for another
upcoming meeting in June is the third annual (Texas Health Home Summit) that's going to take
place in June in San Antonio. And as we got more information on that, I believe it's the 18th and
19th, but once we have kind of those dates and information finalized, we'll make sure that gets to
you guys as well.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you for that. Just a quick -- did anybody have any changes to our minutes
from October? All right. I will consider those approved. If you do have some maybe later you
can send me an email.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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(Jeff Garrison Tate), are you n the phone?
(Jeff Garrison Tate): I sure am. Good morning.
(Marjorie Roueche): (Thanks). Let me open your presentation really quick.
(Jeff Garrison Tate): Okay. I'm getting a pop-up blocker. It's not letting me get too far.
(Marjorie Roueche): Oh, yes, you might have to allow that website on your Explorer.
(Jeff Garrison Tate): It's not cooperating. Can everybody else see the PowerPoint?
Female: Yes.
(Marjorie Roueche): Well, it's still opening right now.
(Jeff Garrison Tate): Okay. Well, if I can't actually get into it, I can pull my PowerPoint up and walk
through it with you guys and…
(Marjorie Roueche): Sure, and I’ll advance the slides.
(Jeff Garrison Tate): … okay, help me click on…
(Marjorie Roueche): Yes.
Female: I can see it.
(Marjorie Roueche): Okay. There it is. (Okay). So…
(Jeff Garrison Tate): I'm going to pull this PowerPoint up. So I don't want to waste…
(Marjorie Roueche): So for those of you who don't know (Jeff Garrison Tate), he’s supported people with
disabilities and their families for 35 years. He started out his career as the direct support
professional in 1979.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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Mr. (Garrison Tate) has served as a Special Education teacher, a Community Services program
director, a community advocacy organizer, policy manager, and as an executive director for the (I
Program. He's one of the founders of Community Now, a statewide non-profit advocacy
organization that speaks out for community services and support for people with disabilities.
Mr. (Garrison Tate) is also a founding partner of the Institutes on Person Centered Practices, and
a mentor trainer with the Learning Community on Person Centered practices. He currently works
at the Center on Disability and Development at Texas A&M University as a program manager and
he lives in (Bryan).
(Jeff Garrison Tate): All right, well, thank you.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thanks again for being here, (Jeff).
(Jeff Garrison Tate): It's my pleasure. I need to take that 1979 thing out of my bio sometime. I'm very old
at this moment. Thank you so much and thank you all for the invitation to spend some time with
you guys this morning. So who am I actually with right now? Who's leading the call?
(Marjorie Roueche): This is (Marjorie Roueche).
(Jeff Garrison Tate): Okay, (Marjorie). Thank you. So you're going to help me click through when I say
please move forward?
(Marjorie Roueche): I am.
(Jeff Garrison Tate): Awesome, okay. Well, I'm on the first slide. Hopefully everyone else is. I'm with
the Institute on Person-Centered Practices, which is a collaborative between UT and A&M. I
work closely with (Shelly Dumas) and (Warren Buckner). And we present training around the
state for several different organizations and families, and on person-centered thinking and
practices. So if we could move to the next slide?
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
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As I'm going through this I'd like you to think about something that's really important to you.
What's something that's really important to you, and just try to keep that in the back of your mind
as we move forward here. Could you go to the next slide?
Okay, I just want to go over really briefly some definitions, so we all kind of understand what
person-centered thinking is. It's not a planning process. Person-centered thinking is about
respectful listening that leads to actions, resulting in people who have control over their lives, who
are valued in their community and they relationships in their world that are paid and not paid
within their communities.
We're going to be talking about some person-centered thinking skills which are skills that help us
discover what's important to and for a person, and best ways to support them. So these skills
reinforce these values, of propelling a learning cycle. It's a very fluid cycle. It helps us support
rather than fix people because, you know, I tend to be a great fixer, and, you know, and I work to
support people. And I'm trying to figure out ways to not fix folks but support them.
This works for humans. It's not about disability necessarily, although I'll be speaking to that. This
is about everyone. And it works at every level in an organization, so there is a piece of
organization change in this process. And it builds a culture of partnership and accountability.
And the process affirms the belief that everyone can learn. Our next slide please?
So we've developed training, kind of going back to the, you know, how a broad audience -- and
this is for everyone. And I'm not going to read through all of those, but there -- you know, what's
happening is, is organizations more and more are looking at providing person-centered planning
and thinking and are looking at ways to figure how to best to support folks based on how the
person defines it.
So we're seeing managed-care organizations and hospice and universities and folks really
looking at making sense of person-centered planning. So we've been really excited about the
different organizations that are working with us to support people.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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Okay, so next slide is number six is, you know, kind of the one of the mantras here is to help
people to get better lives, and not just better paper. And, you know, you read about my, you
know, 35 years in my career, and oh my gosh. And I'm thinking about -- you know, I've done a lot
of paper in my career. And I've done a lot of paper that's mandated. And sometimes honestly,
did the paper really match up to what's important to that person and what they want in their lives
based on how they define it.
This dynamic process ,and it's constantly a cycle of listening to the person, discovery, then
developing an action plan, learning and starting over. So the action plan or the actual personcentered plan is just one piece in the process. And sometimes when you do person-centered
planning, you know, we come up with a great plan maybe, but we don't all the other stuff and
discover what this person really wants to do in their life, or what's important to and for them. So
the action plan is the tip of the iceberg. It's a little bit of a different process than I've experienced.
It's very dynamic.
I want to introduce the core concept of person-centered thinking and that's what is important to
and important for a person and the balance between them. And this is a fundamental concept of
person-centered thinking that we use in this training.
And I want to just go back and -- no, go back but take a look at defining, on the next slide, what's
important to a person. And that definition is about those things that help a person feel satisfied,
contented, comforted, that it's about people who have relationships in our lives, having status.
Not so much that we're, you know -- you know, all powerful, but that we have a place within our
relationship and our communities, and that we have control. Things to do, places to go, our
rituals, the rhythm or pace of our lives, and things to do. These are all things that are important to
folks.
And I wonder what maybe you wrote down as important to you. Typically when I do training,
about 80 percent of people say their family is, and their friends, which is awesome and fabulous.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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And most people really put that down. But when I do this, what's important to me is coffee, which
I have right next to me. And it's not that I don't love my family but coffee is important to me
because it makes my day better. And frankly it might be important for people because it makes
people’s (family) lives better.
So, looking at important for, part one, this is the other side. If we look at important for is about
health and safety. It's about treatment of illness, promotion of wellness, environment. It's about
physical and emotional and being free from fear. So important for is the things about health and
safety. But there's a second part to it.
If what others see as necessary to help a person be valued and to be contributing in their
community. So I just want to tell a brief story about (Andrew) who lives in East Texas. And
(Andrew), we're very connected because we both love coffee. And when he first started to go
into his Starbucks in (Longview) he would cut in front of the whole line to get up, you know, to
order a Starbucks. And if you want to make some people unhappy at Starbucks you cut in front
of them in the morning. I mean, they're already unhappy because they haven't had their coffee.
So he started doing this and he would it again and again. And at first folks were going all right, he
has a disability. But by the second and third time they're going I don't care. This is ridiculous. So
(Andrew) went back and he talked to his dad about folks saying, hey, folks are just -- they don't
really like me at Starbucks. They're saying mean things to me.
So dad went in with (Andrew) and they sat down. I mean, (Andrew) is labeled with autism and
has some physical differences. And his dad -- and he looked at him, now, here is the process.
You know, you go up, you stand in line, you go up, you order, you pay and then you go up over
here and you get your drink.
Oh, said (Andrew). So he started doing that. And as he was doing that he began to meet people
in the line. And, you know, there is a language in Starbucks that, you know, if you go there it's
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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like I want a frappachino with a little bit of the cinnamon today with the cherry on top. And so, he
began to understand that language and began connected with folks.
And people got to know him and they understood he had a lawn business and they were asking
him to mow his lawn. And they learned he was a distance runner. And they became connected.
So he became valued in that part of that Starbucks community which spread out into other
places. And that's about how relationships happen. And that's a key part of this, is how we're
supporting people to not only be seen as valued, but having relationships that are built on
common interest.
So if you go to the next slide you'll see that arrow. And the community arrow is -- really helps, I
think, to illustrate the pieces around important to and for. So if you look at the service life, that's a
place where people find that and that everything is about health and safety. Everything is about,
you know, we're just going to keep you safe.
And some folks say, well, that's an institutional setting. It's a facility. And I'll say, well, not
necessarily. It can be, but it's a place where a person has no control and everything is about
health and safety. And if you look at your life, if everything were about health and safety you may
not be too happy. And some of those people tell us they're not happy because everything is
about health and safety and they tell us with behavior.
So now you're cruising down to a good (paid life). And a lot of people with intellectual disabilities
maybe and other disability labels may find themselves here. They have family. They have few
real friends and they have support staff. And then down at the other end it's community life
where most of us may find ourselves. We have friends. We have people that love and care
about us for who we are, we are getting a life that we define.
And again, you may think of somebody that you know and you support, where you see them on
this arrow? Is their life all controlled? Are they moved down? And they only have people
((inaudible)) in their lives and are they down in their community life?
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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Most people get stuck in a good paid life and I want to mention briefly about a young woman I
know, (Elizabeth Kate). And she is an amazing woman and she also has Down's Syndrome and
she also has a mental illness. She's bipolar, and she moved from one town to another with her
family and her life was all about the good paid life. She had family. She really didn't have
anybody else other than a support staff that was coming in to teach her independent living skills.
So the family looked at what's important to (Elizabeth), you know, things like performing, theater,
being around people, organization, being a fashionista. Those were things that were all important
to her, and what was important for her was her medication, making sure she got support and
transportation to where she was going.
So they found a place that she wanted to volunteer, which was a small theater in this town and
she began to volunteer in the costume shop, and very organized and all about fashion and she
loved that. And people began to get to know her and really appreciate her for who she was, and
she was handing out programs and went to all the plays, kept sitting next to this guy who had kids
and they're playing all the time and (Dennis) -- and (Dennis) got to really like her and figured out
that, you know, she had a lot of skills.
And so, (Dennis), who owned for hair salons in this town offered her a job there. So the idea was
the family didn't go in for her to get a job because those are, you know, goals, but the idea is how
do we support her to be seen as valued? And you know when someone is valued, I think the
family, when I talk to family members, they say when somebody calls me up and they say where
is (Elizabeth), we missed her today. Can I come pick her up? That's a real cue to knowing that
she is, the person is becoming valued and a part of community for who she is.
So if we just go the next slide you'll see this is just another way of addressing this and you'll see
that the bump there that's where a lot of people find themselves, and this has been done with
thousands of people who are looking at the folks that they support. And of course the goal is to
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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get them down this arrow. How many -- how many objectives and goals do people have that say,
how do we support relationships and friendships and getting people to be valued in their lives.
That's not easy and it takes a while. We got to be patient. It's hard to say, you know, (Jimmy), is
going to have three friends in six months. It doesn't work that way. So we need to be creative to
discover important to, but not ignoring health and safety.
So, you know, I had a hip replacement a couple of years ago. And this is really me in the
hospital, I mean, white male, 54 years old, avascular necrosis, hip replacement, noncompliance
with medication routine, physical therapy sessions, inappropriate verbalizations regarding food
options, hits call button for no reason, wife has demanded a D&R.
And I was not a good patient. Everything was about informing, but you know, I had the support in
people who forgave me for my rudeness and supported me to get back down the arrow to my
community and the relationships, so here I am now, walking around and I do the things that are
important to me.
I'm able to move pass that important for and get back to my family, theater, film, chasing my kids
on the beach, that's what's important to me. And a lot of times people with disability labels find
themselves stuck in important for and don't get out of there.
Sometimes planning is all about health and safety and not what people may want in their lives, or
that they even know what they want in their lives. Important to and for are connected. So people
typically don't important for -- health and safety unless it's connected to something that's
important to. It's not about behavioral management. It's about connecting things that are
important to and for.
I have a friend named (David) in San Antonio and he is a really big guy. And we love to go to
lunch. And he has diabetes. He's very big. He's got a lot of labels and we used to go to Chinese
food and he would eat everything fried he could find.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
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And I going, "Oh my gosh, this isn't good." And then the next time we went to Luby's and we got
the Lu Ann platter, but he’d get to Lu Ann platters, and then finally, I said, "Man, I cannot
participate in this, (David). You are eating yourself to death and I'm not going to play."
And I -- but rather than saying I'm not going to have lunch with you anymore, we figured out let's
go to Super Salad and we got what was important to us as well as for. So let's look at some
specific discovery skills. How do we discover what's important to someone? Well, the morning
ritual in that slide you'll see is folks who have their routines and their rituals really tell us a lot
about what's important to a persona and for a person.
If we had enough time, I'd be asking you to write down your morning ritual; from the second you
wake up to the moment that you start your day, what do you do in your day? And do you run?
Do you have a spiritual time? Do you sit down with your loved -- your partner and have an
opportunity to talk?
Do you take your -- do you make sure and take time to take a bath? What is important to you in
that morning? And what happens if that's taken away and it's out of your control? Now, you may
not, you know, throw a chair, but it's not going to make your life better.
You may have missed something and your day is not just right. Or you may, you know, respond.
((inaudible)) if I don't get my coffee in the morning, it's not good. So when you think about people
who have unique support meetings or don't use words to communicate and they're telling us stuff
with their behavior, maybe their rituals are being broken.
What are we doing to support somebody and figure out what's important to them through their
rituals and make sure that that's happening to support them. So there are lots of rituals and
routines in folks’ lives and this is a really fascinating, fantastic way in opinion to discover what's
important to people.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
Confirmation # 167531852
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If you have your rituals changed and it isn't -- you have no control over that, you probably won't
be too happy. So again, I would ask you to write down your ritual. We don't have that. I'm doing
a one-day training here in three minutes, so bear with me.
So let's discover from the morning ritual what's important to the person and for and what supports
do they need to get through the day. This is not like behavior management. It's like let's figure
out what it is that a person needs and what support do they need.
Another discovery tool is what makes for a good day and a bad day. What is it in the person's life
that makes for a good day and what makes for a bad day? And how can we diminish the bad
days? And how can we support someone to get better days, again, but discovering those things
that may be important to and for that person based on a good day and a bad day.
So if you go to the slide 29 I have that says, "A good day during a work week, what does that look
like for you? What happened that contributed to your good day? Who's around you?" For me,
the people around me is, really makes for a good day. And they support me in a lot of ways.
What happens that gives me energy? What motivates me? The bad days, what threw off your
day? Make your day bad, frustrated you and took the fun out of it. And what's so ((inaudible))
that I'm grumpy in the morning, my colleagues will bring me a cup of coffee, I mean, because
they know it's making, it's going to make my day better. Now, am I going to change the world? Is
that going to change the world with this? No, but it is about supporting people to get better lives
every day and again, you can discover important to and for.
And what people, support folks need to get a better life based on looking at important good days
and bad days. The communication chart, I love this skill because it looks at -- if we look at the,
particularly the slide with the blanks and you'll see at the top it says, what's happening?
I do this and it means this and you should do this. So if you look at that third column, it means
what is the emotion? Like, when I get angry, what I do is come home and scrub my counters and
I mumble under my breath. What happened is if something happened at work that really made
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
Moderator: Physician I
01-15-15/10:00 a.m. CT
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me unhappy and you should support me by leaving me alone and let me finish cleaning the
counters. Don't come in and social work me and say, "Oh, (Jeff), I can see you're having a bad
day."
Now, let me finish it -- but it's not that -- don't punish me necessarily. Give me an opportunity and
support me based on the -- that what I have, and this is an extremely powerful skill for people
who are telling us things with their behavior and, you know, for all of us, really.
Management skills are ways that -- we as organizations and folks that support people can do
some things. If you look at the doughnut, I love this one because when it comes to a situation
with the person or yourself or at work, what are your core responsibilities, you identify, what are
those drop dead things you have to do? How do you get creative and use good judgment to
address that issue? And the dotted line is what's not your job. Sometimes in our work we want
to save and make sure that everything is good and maybe we don't, at some point need to say
that's not my job. That's not what I need to be doing. How are we being creative in using great
judgment to help people to get better lives? Because we do the core really well, and the next
place is sometimes difficult.
The for plus one is a way of looking at a specific issue. I've seen this used in management team
as well as looking at -- we can't get past this issue with this person and looked at -- if you were
doing this I’d ask you the question, what have you done to improve your health and safety? What
have you tried? What did you learn from what you tried? What are you pleased about? And
what are you concerned about?
This slows down the thinking, because sometimes we only want to do what we're concerned
about and we don't go back and realize that, you know, we've tried a lot of stuff. We got to learn
from that. And you know what? There are some things that we're pleased about.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
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The next skill is what's working and not working. This is an amazing negotiation skill. It's actually
a conflict resolution skill that looks at, if you look at the slide that says staff’s perspective and
(Julie's) perspective, don't have a lot of time to go through it.
But (Julie) is a young woman who receives supports in a group home. She has intellectual
disabilities and she has staff that support her, and you'll see that at the very bottom and what
make sense and doesn't make sense for the staff it says, planning before (Julie) goes shopping.
But up here, what doesn't make sense to (Julie) is staff not letting me buy things I want. So you
can see that there's a different look at this, but the objective becomes how do we support (Julie)
to buy the things that she wants or understand what she can't buy and rather, and how do we
support her to get there.
So, again, if you go back and forth and we can look at many places where there may be issues,
I've seen that, you know, you add families to this. You add ((inaudible)) other agencies, schools
and getting everyone's perspective and you're looking at it and figuring out together how we can
support this person based on how we all perceive what's going on, and it really pulls the
emotionally charged stuff out of it.
I want to skip to the next one which is the one-page description. Now, this is something that is -- I
think it's very powerful. What it does is it puts in a snapshot of what people like and admire about
a person. What's important to the person? What's important for and what supports they need to
get a better life?
And it really helps to outline who they are. So if you look at the blank page where it says, blank,
one page description, you know, again it's a visual and it's an image of, let's get a snapshot about
what people like and admire. It's about these are the awesome things about this person, again,
what's important to, supports they need and what kind of people around them work well. So this
is (Elizabeth Kate) who I mentioned earlier, and this is what it looks like.
STATE OF TEXAS - DSHS - G31000 PHSU
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So a few things that are important to her are, you know, her independence. You can skip down
and you can say planning for the future, Diet Coke, I'm convinced there's crack in diet Coke,
writing in my journals, avoiding conflict, fashion. All those things are really important to being
organized and prepared and maybe you're seeing where ((inaudible)) pulled out the community
theater as ae place, but, you know, there are things that you got to attend to that are important for
me because I'm not going to get around this and just say, you know, life is -- all is just, you know,
hunky-dory stuff. I need supports. These are the -- these are the health and safety issues you
need to know. And you know what? To support me, please understand that if I'm upset I'm
probably tired and it's not about you. Talk to me nicely and quietly. No bad words.
When people around me are angry, are there -- is there a conflict? Help me get away. These are
supports that she needs. And here are some awesome things about (Elizabeth). She is
determined, self advocate, so if she lives in an apartment and if someone came in to support her
and didn't know really know here, I hope they could pull out this one-page description and be able
to have a conversation, be able to understand some healthy and safety issues and be able to
figure out ways to support her.
You know, you see this in a lot of places. It's used for kids transitioning from one classroom to
another. It's used for people who live in a -- in a community setting. It's usually people who live
at home. It's used for me. It's used for you. I mean, our team should know around this snapshot
about this. So you guys have been, you know, listened to me, run through this very, very quickly
and if you look at the final couple of slides here, this learning will and I mentioned that this
process is fluid.
People's lives don't wait for their next annual plan. If they are, there's not much life going on.
Female: Okay.
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): So what needs -- if you look at to the left, we -- person-centered description, we've
identified important to and for, what supports they need. You move over to what needs to stay
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the same. What needs to change based on what we've discovered, then we do an action plan,
implement and learn from that action plan, and then we do it again.
You know, action planning is the beginning of learning rather than stopping and saying, let's just
do this. The action plan is a part of the entire process. Okay. So the next one is some resources
I have to really recognize the learning community.
(Michael Small’s) work, this is where this comes from. And there are some other resources about
one-page descriptions, you can learn more. And then thank you very much for letting me move
through this very quickly and the opportunity to share a bit about person-centered thinking and
planning and some of the stuff behind it.
And there's my email. If you would like to email me or you can go to our website and maybe
learn more, so thank you all very, very much.
(Marjorie Roueche): All right,. Did anybody have any questions for Mr. (Garrison-Tate)? Well, actually, I
had a quick question, this is (Marjorie). I'm just wondering, you know, you had a slide that had
the person's perspective in it, sort of, in ((inaudible)) which was very nice, but I'm wondering are
there tools that people can use to sort of get that information or is just a lot about observation and
understanding?
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): Well, there's certainly a couple of ways to do it. One way is, you know, it's, you
know, through a meeting process, to have that stuff up on a flip chart to say, let's discover what's
really working for this person and if the people around them are people that know and love the
person, let's identify the things that are really working for this person.
And it's usually around a concern or an issue, or how is this person going to get to move in
community? How is this person going to get to that next step in their world? So it's identifying
the person telling us with words or things that we have discovered that they've told us through
behavior and other ways.
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And we figured out the other side, what's not working. And then it's not too difficult for people
around the person to say, "Hey, this is really not working for me when it comes to this situation.
This is what is working." And then using that, when it all gets up there, you know, it pulls out a lot
of the emotionally charged stuff and so -- but a little bit back to your question, what works and
doesn't work, yes, there could -- there could be a lot of discovery about what works because that
ties to important to.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you. Were there any other questions?
(Maria): Hi. This is (Maria. Jeff).
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): Hi.
(Maria): I was just wondering if you -- if you could tell us about when you're going to have any other
trainings around the state and where those will be?
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): Yes. We're having a training here in College Station, March 3rd through 6th and
you can go on our website to look at it. We're going to do the two-day person-centered thinking
training which really pulls out all of these skills, there's several more than I’ve shared where folks
are going to actually practice it.
They're going to do their own description. And the second to days is doing a plan, taking that info
that we learned and we have a person with -- who needs supports with the disability come in and
we do a plan with the person and practices those skills and develop some goals based on what
we're learning from that person, that person becomes the consultant and, you know, I'll do some
of the work, but the rest of the learners are in the audience listening and learning.
So, yes, that's a for-day training that we have. Right now, we're looking at pulling one together in
May in the Austin area. So if you go on our website there is registration information there.
(Maria): Thank you.
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(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you again. Thank you again.
(Maria): And another question …
(Marjorie Roueche): I'm sorry. What, (Maria)?
(Maria): I'm sorry, another question. (Jeff), what do you find to be a good mix of people for the personcentered training plan when you're working with an individual? What kind of individuals do you
like to see there?
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): Are you talking, you mean when I do the training, the second tw days?
(Maria): Well, no, when you do a plan for an individual -- young adult.
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): Okay. Great question. Typically, you know, it's the person that's presented. I -- I
mean, if it's a family that is looking to develop a plan around the person, with the person, you
know, it's people that with a range of disabilities and labels and, you know, it can be somebody
who doesn't use words to communicate it. It can be someone who's working -- it is dealing with a
dual diagnosis of intellectual disability and mental illness.
It's, you know, so for me it's who's presenting themselves that wants to, you know, do, you know,
go through a planning process like this because the skills are very, you know, they are very -- you
know, they are a base to leap off of to discover stuff. So, I don't know if I'm answering it well, but
it's who wants to do it and who needs that support.
And, you know, so I've done plans with -- I don't know – a range of folks. When I do training, I
like to have a focus person, a consultant, be someone that doesn't use a lot of words because
sometimes they, "That sounds like a really cool saying, but what about this person?" And I
always want to look at this person because -- to share that this is something that's universal, can
work for anyone.
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(Marilyn): I have another question. This is (Marilyn) ((inaudible)). I’d just like to know if we can get a
copy of this PowerPoint. Is that going to be forwarded to us?
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): For me, I mean, sure. If you all want to forward that on, that's fine. Yes.
(Marjorie Roueche): OK, great, great. We'll do that.
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): Yes. Yes. I hope you all practice the tools and come to training and, you know,
again, you know, let me know if you have questions you want to email. Again, I appreciate the
opportunity, and take care.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you. Thank you again.
(Jeff Garrison-Tate): All right. You're welcome. You all have a good day. Bye-bye.
(Marjorie Roueche): Gilda, are you on the phone?
Gilda Lopez: Yes. Hi. Good morning.
(Marjorie Roueche): Hi. Hi. So, would you like me to put up your flyer or the planning sheet?
Gilda Lopez: Well, why don't we try and do the flyers so that people can see what we're talking about?
Female: I already put them down there.
(Marjorie Roueche): All right. It's loading, just slowly.
Female: And there's the (lists) down there because I made extra ((inaudible)). (I can see).
(Marjorie Roueche): Right. Can everyone see the flyer for (Paso), ((inaudible)) as Leadership Academy
for Families?
All right, go ahead, Gilda.
Gilda Lopez: OK.
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Well, hello, everyone. I'm Gilda Lopez with Paso del Norte Children's Development Center in El
Paso. We're far, far West Texas. And (Marjorie) had asked me and I'm happy to share with you
a great resource that offer to families and we've been doing this since 2001 with a lot of success.
And we started off with what we call our -- now, we call it our Traditional Leadership Academy for
Families which is a seven-week program that covers -- as you can see in the brochure -- a lot of
good and important topics that we felt were valuable to parents, no matter what age their child is
at.
You know, of course, we would prefer if parents joined when their child was young. But, you
know, we've had parents that come when their child is already in middle school or even in high
school and they find all of the information very useful.
And, you know, the idea grew out of partners in policy-making. I don't know if anybody that's on
the call remembers when that training was offered in Austin years ago, where parents would
travel from all over the state and get a weeklong training on all the topics that were important to
families in raising a child with special needs.
So, then, when that program ended, you know, some of the parents in El Paso were able to
participate and actually our executive director here at our agency was very impressed, you know,
with the type of information and the format that was presented to families.
So, we thought about doing something similar, but obviously, to offer it only in our community for
parents. So, that's how the concept of the academy grew. And if you can see, it's broken down
by weeks, so the families come. When we do a weekday class, the families usually come twice a
week for three hours. So, it's either Tuesdays and Thursdays or Mondays and Wednesdays.
So, the first week, we talk about the history of the disabilities in (ADA). Second week is special
education. So, every week, we cover a different topic like it's outlined in the brochure. So, really,
you know, we encourage families not to miss a week because we're not going to cover that
information again. But also, we don't want to limit families that, you know, let's say, that we've
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already are in week five and families just barely knew about it. We encourage them to come and
then we encourage them to take the next academy for the classes that they missed.
So, this is the one that we're been doing since 2001. And then, because of the success and also
an overwhelming amount of requests from parents that had children with the recent diagnosis of
attention deficit disorder, we thought about putting together an academy that would fit the
information for those parents. And we did that with another county agency that supports children
and adults with mental health issues.
So, we put together this specific curriculum which is more geared towards, you know, serving this
population. As you can see, this one is seven weeks long as well. The only difference is that this
one only meets once a week for three hours. And when we do a Saturday cohort, we also do the
three hours once a week.
And the topics are outlined there for each week. And again, this one, we do it with community
collaborators. So, sometimes, we have professionals come and present to the families. And
many of the graduates of the academy -- parent graduates of the academy, you know, empower
themselves and feel the need to share the information that they learned with other parents. We
give them an opportunity to come back for additional training and they become kind of like our
faculty. (We call them) our faculty or mentors and they are able to then do the presentations
themselves.
So, it's really like a parent-to-parent opportunity because most of the presenters for all of the
topics are parents themselves. So, it's really, really a great way to empower other families.
And then, we started seeing a lot of calls through our information referral specialist and support
groups of families needing more information on autism. As you all know, you know, the incident
is rising. There are more children identified. So, then, we thought of building an academy just
particularly for those families and we were able to get some funding from Autism Speaks. They
have community grants that they award and we were able to receive one.
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And the benefit of not only of receiving the money, obviously, you know, to particular -- the
curriculum and hire somebody to plan and coordinate and do the classes is that Autism Speaks
was willing to share with us a lot of their information. And if anybody has gone through their
website, you know, it's a website that's full of resources and they have the most current, the latest
information on autism. So, that was a huge help to us so that we can put together the topics for
the families.
So, at any given time, one family can participate in all three academies, if they wish, you know,
and that happens often, because, you know, regardless of their child's diagnoses, a lot of families
want to learn about other diagnoses because they have a friend that has a child with autism or
with ADD or with cerebral palsy and they want to learn more of how to help that friend or family.
So, that's the history behind the academy. You know, I mean, I think last year we had 404
graduates. We've offered -- we've graduated 110 cohorts since we've started. And the group's
very incise. We've had as small as five family members and we've had as large as 30.
When we started the Academy for Autism, it was a huge success and we have to put people in
the waiting list because we didn't want the groups to be larger than 30 and we are getting 50
registrants at one time.
So, you know, I mean, the purpose really is to empower and inform. And we've been able to
grow a lot of leaders in our community that move on and do support groups that have done
awareness campaigns. There are a huge base of volunteers that we use constantly throughout
our activity.
And, you know, recently, we have seen an increase in not just parent participation, but also
professionals, the teams like teachers -- especially the Saturday ones, teachers are coming and
taking the classes, just because, you know, they've expressed to us that they're getting less and
less training available through their districts or the training that they receive is very focused on
classroom instruction and, you know, curriculums and things like that.
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But, they want to learn about what the parent and the family is going through. And they see the
other perspective, you know, from when they are serving the child in the classroom. So, it's been
a great experience.
And, you know, I'm not a parent of a young adult with disabilities. I'm a graduate of the 2001
Academy. So, I know that the information really works and it empowers families and it builds
friendships. Parents have been able to meet other parents that are in the same situation, you
know, that have things in common and they've developed very strong friendships from that and it
benefits not just the parent, but the children themselves as well.
You know, funding has come and gone, but we've never stopped offering it regardless whether
there's funding for it or not. Right now, we are lucky because we do have a full-time staff person
responsible for putting together the schedule of securing the location, making sure that everybody
gets a binder with all the PowerPoint presentations, plus handouts. We do them in English and in
Spanish.
So, right now, we're in a good place where we can offer the three types of academies year-round.
So, as soon as we finish one cohort, we take like a week or to-week break, and then we offer the
next one.
So, I think, you know, if you are interested in doing something like this in your community, I'd be
more than happy to share with you some of the materials that we've been able to put together.
And, I mean, I think that a lot of families get information from going to conferences and going to
larger events. But this is an additional opportunity for them to meet on an ongoing basis and get
all of the information in a comprehensive manner.
And then, from there, you know, we offer all of the other support services that we do in our
agency and we're able to help families that need, for instance, case management or respite or
other things that we offer.
Are there any questions?
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(Marjorie Roueche): There's also some -- this is (Marjorie) -- some of the nuts and bolts Gilda was kind
enough to let me ask her ((inaudible)) the questions and give me wonderful answers and I tried to
collect that information about how to get a program like this up and running on the ((inaudible))
planning sheet which is attached to this meeting in Outlook as well.
And, Gilda, thank you for offering to share your materials, that's very generous.
Gilda Lopez: No problem.
Female: Thank you. That was very good.
(Marjorie Roueche): OK. So, I'm going to -- as we go through our contractor updates, I'm also going to
be just sort of marking off the roll. So, is anyone here from Any Baby Can of Austin?
(Holly Griffin): I am. This is (Holly Griffin).
(Marjorie Roueche): OK. Hi, (Holly).
(Holly Griffin): Hi.
(Marjorie Roueche): Yes, go ahead.
(Holly Griffin): We just really ((inaudible)) about what ((inaudible)) our agency that's also our program.
So, our programs ((inaudible)) holiday event where we had up to 75 attendees come to our
holiday party. It was really exciting. We had a bunch of board members also get to be there to
volunteer. That was really great.
We had Santa Claus, all these different types of games. Families went home with extra food that
we had donated which is new this year. That was also wonderful. And then, just an FYI that Any
Baby Can is actually going to be moving to a new building. Hopefully, by March, we will be in the
new building.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you, (Holly).
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Is there anybody here from Any Baby Can in San Antonio?
(Dana Groman): Yes, (Dana Groman) here.
I just wanted to -- we had a holiday giving program and we served over 55 families. So, each one
of those families received a sponsor who provided to the family's Christmas dinner, things like
that. And then, we also had to Christmas parties, one here in San Antonio and then one in New
Braunfels families. We had about over 600 people attend. Santa was there. Gifts were given,
food, all kinds of stuff for the families to go home with.
And then, just an update on our agency, we have -- we are expanding our mission. We are now
going to be serving children and youth up to 17 years old. We, in the past, have only served up
to 12 years old. So now, we're expanding that to 17. We are in the process of getting our staff
trained with transition resources. And so, beginning in February, we'll start accepting those older
children.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you, (Dana).
Is there anybody here from Cameron County?
(Kat Sanchez): Yes. This is (Kat Sanchez).
(For us), we had our department donate toys -- we had a toy drive. So, our children received gifts
for Christmas. And also, we had enough to share with their siblings. We've also been distributing
coats and sweaters and blankets during this weather. So, pretty much, it's been about keeping
warm.
(Marjorie Roueche): All right. Thank you, (Pat).
(Pat Sanchez): OK.
(Marjorie Roueche): (Marilyn) from ((inaudible))?
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(Marilyn): Hi. During the Christmas holiday, we did an Adopt A Family program which is an annual
program that we actually put in place, and we had close to 100 families adopted. We actually had
99 families adopted by separate donors. And they all received -- every family member received
gifts for Christmas and at least 12 families received, not only gifts, but they also received meals
for Christmas.
In addition to that, we're currently in the local Arlington Office with (Blanca Sanchez) and we’re
reviewing additional resources for referrals that we’re currently getting.
But we’ve been doing a lot of outreach to local hospitals especially Children’s Healthcare Center.
And we recently met with their transition team there and we’re going to be meeting with their
providers over there as well to establish some links for the CSA spot position that they have there
as well.
I think they currently -- we’re planning an event for March to do like a mini health fair. We don’t
have all the details yet because we’re trying to gather some providers for that. But as soon as we
get that data, we’ll forward that to you as well. Are there anything else coming right now? I think
that’s basically it that we have right now.
(Marjorie Roueche): All right. Thank you (Marilyn).
(Marilyn): Sure.
(Marjorie Roueche): (Molly), are you here from the (CSNN)?
(Molly): I am. Good morning. Over Christmas break, we hosted a ((inaudible)) family showing, Night at
the Museum. We had a 127 people attend so it’s very well-attended for our event.
We also over the break hosted two painting days with, to local painting with a twist which is a
great little place to go for some fun painting. And we hosted those events for children of transition
age and passed out transition information to the parents who attended that as well.
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Currently, our organization is working with the Temple Parks & Leisure ((inaudible)) with a
Valentine’s Daddy-Daughter Dance and it’s going to be held February 21st in Temple. We’re also
beginning to work on our spring break activities all over Region 7, so we’re excited about starting
the planning for that. And we have scheduled our annual play date and Peaceable Kingdom
Retreat Center for Children in Killeen and that will be held on Saturday, March 28th. So we are
often rolling in 2015..
(Marjorie Roueche): Great. Thank you (Molly). Is there anyone here from (Stars)?
(Amy): Yes, I’m here. This is (Amy).
(Marjorie Roueche): Okay, great.
(Amy): Over the past quarter, our program update, we were reviewing our forms, modifying some forms,
implementing some new initiatives early December. And as part of the holidays, we were -received donations through the PetsMart of the dogs and cats that they have this year and we
were able to provide those out to all of our children we saw during that month as well as siblings.
We have plenty to go around. That’s really what we were doing this quarter.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you. And (Maria)?
(Maria): Hi. Hello everybody. Over the last few months, we’ve been attending a lot of different health
fairs in different communities throughout the Panhandle.
We also had an opportunity to speak at the Catholic Church here in Amarillo to a group of people
who go out and minister to families in need. And they came and asked us to present on
((inaudible)) after they heard PSA on the news about our program, so I felt really good about that.
And we -- actually we saved some referrals from that.
We also got to speak to a Special Olympics camp at Talon Point which is north of Amarillo and
Channing. And we had about 60 parents come out to that and they were there with their children,
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with their families, and the kids were doing activities and crafts and doing some horseback riding
and paddling while we were having a workshop.
The parents got resources on transition, on guardianship (wheels). We went over out handbook,
our resource handbook and we discussed ((inaudible)) waiver programs, the interest list. So a lot
of really good information to the families. And then we also participated with the Panhandle
Coalition for transition services and helped collaborate on that project.
And we had a career fair that the service center sponsored and had speakers -- had about 300
students come from around the Panhandle who were juniors and seniors. And they got to visit
with all the -- lots of different agencies who provide services to young adults with disabilities and
they also got to go into many workshops that included how to speak – do an interview how to
handle finances and then housing and there was one other topic, dress for success -- excuse me,
not that, I can’t remember at this time.
But anyway, there was some really good breakout sessions for those students. So those are
some of the things that we did in the first quarter.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you (Maria). (Rita), are you here from Girls Inc.?
(Rita): I am. How are you?
(Marjorie Roueche): Good.
(Rita): So I think I’m just going to give you the big highlight. We were able to arrange a field trip with our
girls to go to Lockheed Martin and their facility over in Aerospace Center in Houston where they
got to meet astronauts and a food engineer who creates space food and tour the facility a little bit.
They really enjoyed that. They got to view the Orion space launch and ((inaudible)). And the
other thing that we’re doing is we have a group of dentists who are dedicating and donating time
to provide cleanings and checkups to some of our girls for free. So we’re currently working on
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gearing up for our spring camp and our spring break camp and we’re working on some initiatives
coming up in the next quarter. That’s it.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone here from Harris Health? Anybody
here from (Jasper Newton)? All right, (Gilda), do you want to give us a quick update?
(Gilda): Yes. Well right now, what we’re working on is we’re planning along with another nonprofit
organization, we’re cosponsoring the 26th Annual Children’s Disability Symposium and, you
know, it’s on March 7th. I will send you the registration form so that you can share it with
everybody.
But it’s a really great all-day event for families and professionals. We have some keynote
speakers that are -- there are going to be some young adults, self advocates sharing their story.
And the title of the symposium this year is parent involvement is at the heart of every great idea.
And then there’s going to be breakout sessions on special education, transition, guardianship,
and positive behavior interventions.
And then there’s going to be a track also for childcare providers so that they learn some skills on
how to make accommodations for their -- if they have children with special needs in their
childcare centers. And we will also be offering (Epic) for social workers and that’s always a draw
since social worker’s need, those (Epic) hours for their license.
So I’ll be sending you that information. Like I said, it’s March 7th and we expect around 400 plus
families.
(Marjorie Roueche): Wow, that’s a lot. Thanks (Gilda). (Kara), are you here from ((inaudible)) Care
Center?
(Kara): I am. How are you all? Christmas of course was wonderfully bananas around here. Lots of
parties, we had multiple parties because we have many service delivery options. One of the neat
ones was all the families in our daycare instead of a toy or a present received a gift card to get
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new sneakers at Payless and that was through a corporate sponsor that was able to do that for
us. So those kind of things are wonderful to see happen over the holidays.
Other than that, we’re straddling the quarter working on securing all the information to make sure
everybody has their medical home. We have our SQHC here on site. So working with our
program team in conjunction with the nursing team to make sure that every kid is reregistered in
that systems if they have medical home and insurance and can be tracked.
And then on the horizon for straddling this the next quarter is working on with the Department of
Family Protective Services on better serving some of the families that take on children in the
Kinship capacity. So a lot of times it’s grandparents, aunts, or ((inaudible)) kin are taking on
kiddos with special needs and they don’t have the resources, not just financial but informational
resources. So trying to find a way where we can support them to make sure that our population
is surrounded in that parent field or the kin -- the caregiver skills, educated and supported. So
that’s it for now.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great, thank you. Is there anyone here from Scott and White?
(Nadal): This is (Nadal). Hi, good morning. So we actually have some new members to the team and it
seems kind of getting started. We have to new orthodontists, one for our Temple team, one for
our College Station team. The one in College Station is actually donating his time to our team to
evaluate our patients, our kiddos there.
And we have a new dietician for our neuromuscular team here in Temple. And we have, one
really big thing is, we have to new teams that we are looking at getting started. One -- actually,
technically three. One has not -- it wasn’t up and going for a while. And then two completely new
ones that we’ve been approached to start here at the hospital. And one is a female adolescent
clinic. So young ladies that are -- have started going through changes and they need help, but
yet they aren’t comfortable enough to go through certain doctors and maybe they have special
concerns or issues.
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Also a trach or ventilation clinic, so kiddos who have trach or meds and they need special
attention from certain specialists. So we’re looking at getting those started and we’re really
excited about those members -- team members and specialists coming to be part of our program.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great, thank you (Nadal). (Tom) from Share?
(Tom): Yes, good morning. In the past quarter, we had -- we had the Halloween celebration. We had
around 200 people show for that.
We did a SIP shop training with (Don Meyer) at UTPB and trained facilitators and one of the neat
things is that we were able to partner with UTPB counseling students to train them as facilitators
and they’ll be able to use the time that they work with our siblings as practicum hours.
We also had a Sibling Celebration dinner where (Don) spoke and we recognized Sibling
scholarship winners and just the Siblings themselves, had a busy Christmas time with candlelight
Christmas dinner, a Sibling Christmas party and a separate Sensory Santa for the kids -- for the
kids with special needs.
And then things that we’re working on right now, we’re trying to gear up our NICU parent support
program. So we actually have a staff dedicated to that now and that looks very promising. We
may be able to get some of our support parents or staff on some of the discharge -- in some of
the discharge meetings so that we can kind of help those moms and dads and kids as they leave
the NICU.
And then one other thing that we’re working is partnering with Texas Children’s to host a Genetics
Conference. So they’ll be bringing speakers in. And we want to focus on Downs Syndrome and
we plan on having it on March 21st on Downs Syndrome -- World Downs Syndrome Day. And in
addition, we’re planning to do an emergency preparedness there as well. So those are some
things that we’ve done and are doing right now.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great, thank you (Tom). I was curious what a Sensory Santa entails exactly.
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(Tom): Well, we have a -- we have a room that has activities and we scheduled our parents -- and we
scheduled our parents to come according to their last name. And so we didn’t -- it wasn’t
overbearing. There weren’t a lot of kids there. Maybe I would say 10 parents, 10 families at a
time. And so we had activities for the kids to do and then we took the kids one at a time, they
drew -- they had numbers and we took them one at a time to Santa in another room so there
wasn’t waiting. And then we also have a Sensory room where we had the lights were low, we
had fiber optics, we had bubble tubes, fiber optic things and just some tactile things for the kids to
kind of stay -- the kids could stay there and they weren’t over stimulated.
So it worked really well to have all of those options for the kids and parents really appreciate it -appreciated that too.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great, thanks (Tom). (Paula) from Texas Children’s.
(Paula): Hi, this is (Paula). We finished one session of our Saturday Wellness program at -- with the
Texas Children’s West Campus and we had a really good show of families.
And now, we just started last Saturday at the Clear Lake ((inaudible)) and it’s going well so far,
you know, we’re provide -- we’re doing the same thing we usually do providing the physical
activities and nutrition activities and some arts and crafts for the kids and teens and then a group
discussion for the parents and family members.
So -- and now we started following up with the ones that went to the session before I guess to
see following up and seeing if everything’s going well just by over the phone and then if they need
referrals or more assistance to other programs, we give them that information.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great, thank you (Paula). (Laura) from (Parents to Parents).
(Laura): Hi. Excuse me. We are mostly working on conferences. We have the one in (Hurst) in
February and we’re trying to get a date for one in Port Isabel in the Valley in May, and then we
have our June conference, the two-day conference.
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We are also working on our peer support training, trying to get that on a webinar basis because
the travel is kind of killing the staff to travel across the state trying to do face-to-face meetings.
We will probably still do face-to-face as well but we hope to get more parents trained for the
(matching), and that’s about it. (Susan) are you on?
(Susan): I am on.
(Laura): Do you have anything to add?
(Susan): No, I think you hit the highlights of what we’re working on and supporting parents of course.
(Laura): Yes.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great, thank you. (Yolanda) from (Ark)?
(Yolanda): Yes, good morning everyone. Well, for the Thanksgiving holidays, we opened the community
in asking for assistance for families and actually families were assisted with not only some turkey
but also their fixings in these beautiful baskets.
We also organized the (Wrap the Ark in Cheer) which again we opened it up to the community for
assistance and actually had 28 families that were assisted. And wonderful was the fact that it
was the whole family. We had one family who had a difficult year and ((inaudible)) on some other
things that were happening in their lives. They had a refrigerator that was going out and we
actually had a donor provide a gift card to take care of that refrigerator, which was really
wonderful.
And again, kudos and praising to the ((inaudible)). As far as our presentations are concerned, we
continue to extend our systems to support groups and school districts. We completed a
presentation to elementary -- an elementary school, families of young children and provided them
information not only of course of what the benefits are provided through the children with special
healthcare needs programs but also with other resources, respite and services available in our
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community, of course Medicaid waivers and just a lot of information provided to families. So we’ll
continue with that this quarter too. Thank you.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you (Yolanda). (Stephanie), are you here from (Trinity)?
(Stephanie): Yes, good morning. In the last quarter in the fall, we participated with one of our healthcare
providers to provide a zoo day for all of our special needs kids.
This quarter, we have -- did the same thing with the same provider, only this time arranged for the
kids to go to the (Power Mall) and have their picture made with Santa when the mall wasn’t in full
operation, it was like early morning Sunday.
We also treated our kids at our respite there in the center December with a visit from Santa at the
Center based programs. For our mom’s group, we provided them with their annual mom’s
Christmas party and we always encourage our families to bring somebody that has provided them
with extra support or encouragement throughout the year to celebrate Christmas with.
And other than that, we’re working with East Texas Center for Independent Living on an event
that’s going to happen in March, it’s going to be called a Disability Expo Walk to Enroll. And the
purpose of that is we’re trying to make it a regional event to bring together individuals of all ages
and families that are affected in one aspect or another with disability and it’s going to be a focus
for our community engagement and there will be recreational activities there, wheelchair races,
that the whole ideal is for it to be disability service oriented. So people in the community can set
up booths and provide all sorts of information on disabilities, no matter what the age of the
individual. And that’s pretty much what we did.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you (Stephanie). (Shelly), are you here from (Families Can)?
(Olga): (Shelly) is not here, she’s out but this (Olga ((inaudible)) with Families Can). And we’ve been
obviously seeing our clients and doing our home visits.
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But what we’ve done is we have a contact over at the Children’s Museum of Houston and so they
gave us passes or free passes for our families so we gave those out. We also collaborate with
NRG Stadium, we have a contact over there where they give us vouchers for the Disney on Ice,
it’s a discounted ticket that families can go and purchase that. The kids really, really enjoy that.
The other things that we’ve done is that we participated in the Baylor College of Medicine, Clinic
Illness and Transition Congress with Dr. (Hurin Groder) and I was actually a presenter there. And
so I presented to the professionals what the challenges are of a parent of having a special needs
child and what the obstacles are that we have to go through as well as how important it is to
collaborate with professionals and with us so that we can better care for our children.
During the holidays, what we did is the University of Houston has a challenger program, these are
students that are first time college attendees for their families and they give back to the
community so they adopted some of our families and they gave at least 16 of families and each
child received at least 10 to 12 gifts per child. So that was a really great thing for our kids, they
really enjoyed that.
And then the Yuletide Baptist Church which (Shelly) is the member of also adopted some of our
families to provide food baskets for the Christmas holidays that included turkey and all of the
fixings. Tonight, we’ll be having transition workshop in collaboration with the Shriners Hospital
and Texas Children’s Health (Staff).
And then we are also going to start preparing for our transitional family educational event which
we have in July. This will be our four year doing it and each year just gets bigger and better and
we have -- last year, we had about 100 to 120 families participate and we’re hoping to top that
number this year.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great, thank you so much. (Antoinette), are you here from (Chosen)? Anybody
here from University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio? Anybody here from West
Texas Rehab Center?
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(Barbie): Yes, this is (Barbie).
(Marjorie Roueche): Hi (Barbie).
(Barbie): In recent, we had our Angel Tree program and that’s to adopt families within our center that do
not qualify for any kind of Christmas help. And we were able to help 26 families.Each family got a
gift card for food. The kiddos’ names, we put their name on a little ornament on a tree and people
can either buy toys for them or clothes. So we did that in December and that was 59 children that
were helped of the 26 families. And tonight we have a support group meeting in San Angelo.
Our speaker will be addressing nutrition and having -- encourage a family to eat healthier. And
just provide services to our families.
(Marjorie Roueche): Great. Thank you (Barbie).
(Barbie): Thank you.
(Marjorie Roueche): And very quickly, is there anybody here from health -- from Region 1?
(Pat): Yes. This is -- this is (Pat) with Region 1.
(Marjorie Roueche): Okay, great. Thank you. Region 2, 3?
(Blanca Sanchez): Yes. This is (Blanca Sanchez).
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you (Blanca). Anybody from 4, 5 North?
(James Frasier): (James Frasier).
(Slida Youngblood): And (Slida Youngblood).
(Marjorie Roueche): Hi (Slida). Anybody from 6, 5 South? Anybody from Region 7?
Female: They all left.
(Marjorie Roueche): From Region 8?
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(Katherine Velasquez): (Katherine Velasquez).
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you. 9, 10?
(Joan Mundy): (Joan Mundy).
(Marjorie Roueche): And Region 11?
(Diana Baramas): Hi, this is (Diana Baramas).
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you. Thank you. So I -- just a quick closing, I wanted to let you know that
your program specialists, that would be (Jennifer and Jeffrey) will be contacting you in the next
few weeks to schedule a time to check in about your progress this year both programmatically
and physically.
So I wanted to give you a heads up about that. We’re in the process of looking at funding and
there’s no -- there’s no problem if you’re not going to spend all your funds if you let us know about
that now. Sorry, that probably wasn’t the most elegant way to say that.
But we will be checking in about how you’re doing with your physical -- with your budget and
such. So I wanted to give you a heads up about that. I also wanted to check in and see if
anybody has any sort of comments or questions about the new quarterly report template or
feedback for us about parts that you got stuck on or just any comments in general? All right.
(Maria): (Marjorie), this is (Maria).
(Marjorie Roueche): Hi (Maria).
(Maria): Hi. Not necessarily something I got stuck on but we give our families contact survey after we
visit with them initially, new family coming in to our program because we want to make sure that
the referral process was pretty streamlined and get them feedbacks on them.
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But it’s not an annual survey but I still collect the data. And I was just wondering if that would be
something you’d like to see on the quarter report?
(Marjorie Roueche): Yes. It’s -- you know, we’re I guess primarily concerned with that client satisfaction.
But if you -- if there’s a place on the quarter report if you get good feedbacks to add it, I think that
would be fine. We would like to hear.
(Hall): (Maria), are you asking them the questions that we’ve got the required questions or just survey?
(Maria): They’re general questions. Some of them could be those questions but they’re general
questions like, “Was staff responsive to you?” You know, “Did you get a phone call back?” So
not necessarily the questions on the annual survey but they’re all about customer courtesy.
That’s where my questions are around.
(Hall): Yes. Go ahead and list that in one of the narrative questions in the beginning part because it
would be -- it would be good to see that. But in the survey area, just utilize that for your annual
surveys.
(Maria): Okay, thank you.
(Marjorie Roueche): Thank you for the question. Does anybody else have any questions or comments
before we adjourn? All right. Thank you all again for your time. And be expecting to hear from
your program specialists to schedule some time to just check in. Thank you everybody.
Male: Thank you.
(Hall): Thank you.
END