Retreat, Inc., NY
Retreat, Inc. (The Retreat) will lead a focused partnership, Project SPARK (Supported Parents and Resilient Kids), as a community-wide effort that will work systematically to address gaps in underserved pockets of Suffolk County. This will be accomplished by proactively seeking and identifying children exposed to abuse, reaching these children and their non-abusing parent via collaboration with partnering organizations across the County, building trust and access to needed services, and offering an array of client-centered, trauma-informed interventions rooted in evidence-informed practices and/or strategies.
This project will:
1) train 900+ staff and volunteers across at least 18 youth- and family-serving organizations in a “Recognize-Respond-Refer” approach to spot the signs of children who have experienced or been exposed to abuse and to take follow-up action;
2) work closely with Child Protective Services, police, and other community agencies to address increasingly known immediate child safety needs; and
3) directly deliver specialized, culturally and age-appropriate counseling (individual, joint child-parent, and group), safety planning, support groups, and advocacy for each affected family member, with an emphasis on using a person-centered approach and evidence-informed strategies to help assure that local children exposed to household violence and their non-abusing parents receive residential and/or non-residential support as needed.
