Greater Boston Area

2010-2011

Adoption & Foster Care Mentoring - AFCMentors
Adoption & Foster Care Mentoring is a not-for-profit organization that is dedicated to providing mentoring partnerships for foster and adopted youth in Boston. The AFCMentors program matches at-risk youth in foster care with committed volunteer mentors in consistent one-to-one relationships. Mentors are intensively screened and trained to work with youth who have experienced abuse and neglect. The program supports and empowers youth by teaching them that they are not alone in their foster care experiences and helping them set goals for personal success. http://www.afcmentoring.org/

Children's Charter, A Division of The Key Program, Inc. - The Foster Parent Partnership Program "Three-Legged Stool"
Children’s Charter is an outpatient mental health clinic providing specialized services to underprivileged children, adults, and families who are survivors of trauma. The Foster Parent Partnership Program creates nurturing, reparative family environments for severely traumatized foster children and is a three-way therapeutic partnership between Children’s Charter, foster parents, and the Department of Children and Families.  Foster families are provided with an array of services such as individual and family therapy, foster parent support groups, and emergency intervention. The program’s primary goal is to maintain foster children in their foster homes until they are either adopted or returned to their biological families. http://www.key.org/

The Family Center, Inc. - The Parenting Journey™
The Family Center is a private, not-for-profit family services agency. The Family Center’s Parenting Journey™ program is a parent education and support group for low-income parents who have lost, or are at risk of losing, their children to the foster care system. The program is designed to help parents increase their self-care practices, raise awareness of the past and present factors that influence their parenting styles, enhance their parenting skills, and utilize their strengths to build nurturing family relationships. http://www.thefamilycenterinc.org/

Friends of Children's Trust Fund - Child Personal Safety Program
Children’s Trust Fund (CTF) is Massachusetts’ only statewide public-private partnership dedicated solely to the prevention of child abuse and neglect. Friends of the Children’s Trust Fund’s Child Personal Safety Program conducts child personal safety training groups in Boston for parents, teachers, childcare professionals, public safety personnel, and other direct care providers. Through comprehensive programming and training, the Child Personal Safety Program works with staff and parents to provide children, preschool through grade 4, the basic skills to keep them safe from dangerous or abusive situations, with the goal of ultimately preventing further incidences of sexual abuse. http://www.mctf.org/ and http://www.onetoughjob.org/

Massachusetts Citizens for Children (MCC) - Supporting Health Care Providers to Better Diagnose and Prevent Shaken Baby Syndrome/Abusive Head Trauma
Massachusetts Citizens for Children (MCC) is a statewide child advocacy organization. MCC’s Supporting Health Care Providers program seeks to reduce infant deaths and disabilities from Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS) and other forms of physical abuse among children under three. The project will support health care providers in diagnosing SBS cases and conveying SBS prevention information by producing and distributing MCC’s SBS prevention training curriculum. http://www.masskids.org/

Parents Helping Parents - Parents Support Group Network of Greater Boston
Parents Helping Parents is a not-for-profit organization providing support to parents who are isolated, overwhelmed, or are too embarrassed or ashamed to ask for help from people they know. The Parents Support Group Network of Greater Boston is based on the anonymous, mutual support model and serves families under stress that are willing to work on improving parent-child relationships. Project activities include recruiting and training volunteer group facilitators, publicizing groups to promote awareness, and maintaining an evaluation system to measure the effectiveness of the parent support group service. http://www.parentshelpingparents.org/