Cayuga/Seneca Community Action Agency, Inc. is proud to introduce a new program in Cayuga and Seneca counties. The Healthy Families Cayuga/Seneca program started operating two months ago and has already received more than 100 referrals of pregnant women and families with an infant less than 3 months of age who may benefit from the program.
Healthy Families Cayuga/Seneca's services are designed to strengthen families during the first five years of a child's life when most early brain development occurs. According to a report released by the Carnegie Corporation of New York: “The earliest years of a child's life are society's most neglected age group, yet new evidence confirms these years lay the foundation for all that follows.”
The program is free and completely voluntary and provides eligible Cayuga and Seneca County families in their service area with regular visits from trained family support workers with the goal of improving the health and well-being of children by educating and supporting their parents. Parents must enroll in the program before the baby is 3 months old and visits from the family support workers may continue until the child is 5 years of age or enrolled in Head Start or Kindergarten. The program is easily accessible to isolated families and is respectful of cultural and community diversity.
Cayuga/Seneca Healthy Families program services include: linking families with community services, health care, child care and housing, encouraging self-sufficiency through education and employment, modeling effective parent-child interactions, providing child development, nutrition and safety education and providing emotional support and encouragement to parents.
Home visits are designed to improve the parent-child relationship, teach about child development, encouraging optimal growth, address family problems and develop individual family plans for self-sufficiency and functioning. Visits are individually suited to the parent(s) and child and use varied curricula selected by the program to meet their needs. Children and parents are also screened using instruments that measure developmental progress and parental stress. Intensity of services is based on each family's needs, beginning weekly and moving gradually to quarterly home visits as families become more self-sufficient.
Shay Bilchik, CEO of the Child Welfare League of America, when asked what his one wish would be for children in America responded: “More home visiting programs that provide service to families before parents take their stresses out on their children.”
“It's so hard for families who don't have support systems. We're helping families by connecting them to other agencies and services and by providing them with the information they need,” said Kim Peterson, one of the program's supervisors.
If you need information about the Healthy Families Cayuga/Seneca program or know a pregnant woman or a family with an infant under 3 months of age, please contact us at 283-2030 in Cayuga County or 539-5647 in Seneca County.
Marcia Ford is the director of the Healthy Families Cayuga/Seneca program for Cayuga/Seneca Community Action Agency. She can be reached at C/SCAA at 283-2030
The program is free and completely voluntary and provides eligible Cayuga and Seneca County families in their service area with regular visits from trained family support workers with the goal of improving the health and well-being of children by educating and supporting their parents. Parents must enroll in the program before the baby is 3 months old and visits from the family support workers may continue until the child is 5 years of age or enrolled in Head Start or Kindergarten. The program is easily accessible to isolated families and is respectful of cultural and community diversity.
Cayuga/Seneca Healthy Families program services include: linking families with community services, health care, child care and housing, encouraging self-sufficiency through education and employment, modeling effective parent-child interactions, providing child development, nutrition and safety education and providing emotional support and encouragement to parents.
Home visits are designed to improve the parent-child relationship, teach about child development, encouraging optimal growth, address family problems and develop individual family plans for self-sufficiency and functioning. Visits are individually suited to the parent(s) and child and use varied curricula selected by the program to meet their needs. Children and parents are also screened using instruments that measure developmental progress and parental stress. Intensity of services is based on each family's needs, beginning weekly and moving gradually to quarterly home visits as families become more self-sufficient.
Shay Bilchik, CEO of the Child Welfare League of America, when asked what his one wish would be for children in America responded: “More home visiting programs that provide service to families before parents take their stresses out on their children.”
“It's so hard for families who don't have support systems. We're helping families by connecting them to other agencies and services and by providing them with the information they need,” said Kim Peterson, one of the program's supervisors.
If you need information about the Healthy Families Cayuga/Seneca program or know a pregnant woman or a family with an infant under 3 months of age, please contact us at 283-2030 in Cayuga County or 539-5647 in Seneca County.
Marcia Ford is the director of the Healthy Families Cayuga/Seneca program for Cayuga/Seneca Community Action Agency. She can be reached at C/SCAA at 283-2030
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