PDN Article: August 3, 2013
It is heartwarming to know that despite the sequestration we are
experiencing, nationally and locally, the federal government was able to award
Guam the amount of $1 million a year for four years to implement the system of
care expansion plan that was developed for our island children from birth to
young adulthood.
This grant is
known as "Para Todu I Famagu'on-ta,"or For All Our Children.
This award
speaks to the importance of children's mental health and our responsibility as
a community to ensure all our children get the best care possible, and a chance
to grow up healthy, to experience positive opportunities and become productive
members of a community.
The
implementation grant award will focus on developing a unified system of care
which provides a broadly supported, sustainable array of home- and
community-based services that enables children and youths to achieve their
maximum potential and builds on the strengths of our diverse families.
5 primary goals
There are five
primary goals and objectives of Para Todu I Famagu'on-ta:
• Adopt
care standards and protocols based on systems of care values, principles and
best practices across all child-serving agencies through policy changes,
contracts and memorandum of agreements;
• Enhance
and sustain a family-driven, youth-guided array of home- and community-based
services by expanding parent and youth peer support services, retooling
existing services and filling in services gaps by enhancing respite care,
therapeutic foster care and transitional services;
• Attain
diverse funding sources which will adequately sustain Guam's systems of care by
accessing Medicaid funding for children's mental health services, pooling and
braiding child-serving agency funds, and redirecting funds from higher-cost to
lower-cost services;
• Establish
a systems of care training program to build workforce capacity across
child-serving agencies and providers, including family and youth peer
specialists; and
• Gain
broad community acceptance and support through the implementation of a
youth-guided, culturally relevant anti-stigma campaign, called
"icareguam," that targets parents, students and educators.
There are
several personnel positions in this grant that are available for recruitments,
these are: administrative data clerk, social marketing/public relations
officer, youth peer specialists and family peer specialists.
If interested,
please submit a government of Guam job application form.
Upcoming
workshop
An upcoming
event for Aug. 12-14 is a workshop: "Game Change! System of Care and Young
Adults of Transition Age." It's a gathering of all public child-serving
agencies to work on a strategic plan focused on supporting successful
transition of this vulnerable population of youth and young adults with serious
mental-health conditions.
Annie F.B. Unpingco, LCSW, is an administrator at the Guam
Behavioral Health and Wellness Center.
