GRANT FUNDED COMMUNITY SERVICES

Childrens Advocacy Center of the New River Valley (CAC-NRV)

The Children’s Advocacy Center was established through a University-Community Partnership and is governed by a Task Force made up of representatives from law enforcement, commonwealth’s attorneys, DSS, RU, and advocates for child victims of violence. The CAC is a community-based program that serves alleged child abuse victims and non-offending family members with the goals of reducing trauma to alleged victims and more effectively prosecuting perpetrators of abuse and violence against children. The Center provides a non-threatening, child friendly environment where trained neutral forensic interviewers perform developmentally appropriate interviews with alleged child victims. The CAC model endorses a multi-disciplinary approach to child abuse investigations.

Community Resource Adoptive and Foster Family Training (CRAFFT)

The CRAFF initiative is a statewide program whose primary focus is training and supporting resource, foster, kinship, and adoptive families throughout Virginia. The state is divided into six service areas and each area has a designated CRAFFT coordinator who works at a state University within/bordering the service area. The two coordinators, serving the Western and Piedmont areas of Virginia, work at RU SSW with the ICF. The goals of the CRAFFT program are directly related to state program improvement goals that focus on better outcomes for children in our foster care system.

Certificate Program in Eligibility Practice

The Certificate Program is a partnership between the City of Roanoke Department of Social Services and the Radford University School of Social Work. The Certificate Program offers twelve (12) credit hours with content delivered in four course modules. Course educational outcomes and core competencies are based on “best practice”. Educational outcomes are focused on effective benefit determination and re-determination for individuals seeking financial, medical, and emergency assistance and food stamps. Educational outcomes include the preparation of Eligibility Workers who will demonstrate: 1) “best practice” models, and competencies, in keeping with agency policy and procedures; 2) respect and acceptance of the unique characteristics of diverse customers; 3) knowledge of the history of eligibility work and its current role in the delivery of social services; and 4) “conscious use of self” as an eligibility professional.

FAMIS

Virginia Healthcare Foundation funds the RU FAMIS Outreach Program. The goal of the program is to increase enrollment of eligible children in the FAMIS, FAMIS plus, and FAMIS moms programs. Families and children throughout the New River Valley, Roanoke Valley, Wythe, Bland, Carroll, Grayson, Patrick counties and the city of Galax are assisted with enrollment in the FAMIS programs by project staff and student interns. FAMIS Outreach staff along with local partner agencies have been part of very effective statewide policy and procedural changes that have helped improve overall health care access in Virginia.

Grandparents Raising Grandchildren

The Grandparents Raising Grandchildren program is a psycho-educational support group for grandparents (and other relatives) who are currently raising their grandchildren. The group meets monthly in Pulaski County. The goal of this group is to assist, strengthen, and support the families in their endeavor to provide a stable environment for their grandchildren.

Celebrating Children and Families Conference (CCFC)

The Celebrating Children and Families Conference is recognized as a showcase for programs and projects that can be used as models for best-practice, a forum for policy dis­cussion and advocacy, and a prime source of information on new research findings in work with children and families. Practitioners, administrators, educators, advocates, researchers, and students are encouraged to share their expertise with others at this multidisciplinary conference.

During this conference we celebrate children and families by recognizing the struggles that today’s families face in parenting children and supporting elder adults. We honor and affirm the commitment of the thousands of people who have dedicated their lives to the caring professions and we call younger generations to join this valued work. Finally, we encourage organizations to transform themselves to respond to the opportunities and challenges of the future.