Find out all the happenings that are going on at the Family Involvement Center by reading our latest newsltter.

In the Know ...  In the Now

FIC Staff Share the Buzz ~ Families First

Brought to you by ~
Dawn
with the Assistance of the Awesome Staff
of Family Involvement Center!

May is Mental Health Awareness Month!

May 15, 2008

Staff Successes—Adam Armstrong & Kenny Dobbs made a well-received presentation at the
Mental Health America of Arizona’s Seeds for Success Symposium on April 23rd. The title of
the presentation was “Discovering Needs for Youth to Succeed: Improving Quality of Life for
Youth and Families Through Creating Opportunities for Partnership with Professionals.” All
the evaluations rated the team with top marks! Woo hoo!

More Staff Successes—FIC Staff presented at 6 (yes, six!) workshops at the Community
Development Family Leadership Conference, May 13th & 14th! Kudos to Jane Kallal, Toni
Issadore, Erika Montano, Kenny Dobbs, Deidre Ransom, Lillian Armstrong and Laurie Ellington

System Successes—Dawn Schoenstadt & Angelica Paiz presented “Possibilities of Sharing
Targeted Parent Assistance (TPA)” at Magellan’s Monthly Child/Adolescent Advisory
Committee meeting on May 13th. Several Magellan reps and a Network rep were excited to
look for new partnerships with FIC to get families into our database and services, as well as
to assist with tracking trends that the PNO’s and Magellan can work on.

Family Successes—Don Vandenbrul is a widowed parent with special needs children—one of
whom transitioned last year to the adult system. Don has shared his ups and downs with the
process, but has grown by leaps and bounds as an advocate for his son and for the Behavioral
Health System. Don has been coming to meetings at FIC for over two years and has
participated in both the Family Advisory Committee and the Child & Family Advisory
Partnership with Magellan (and formerly with VO). For the past several months, Don has been
active on the Governing Board with Quality Care Network. Don has been supported by
Linda Cameron (his former FSP), Bettie Jordan and many others at FIC, helping to nurture his
natural leadership abilities. Those of us who have shared with Don are helped by his
parenting wisdom, his tenacity and his spiritual strength.

FIC Sadness—We are saying farewell to a wonderful and valuable friend and co-worker.
Sherry Candelaria is re-locating to South Carolina and is exploring possibilities of staying
involved with Behavioral Health “back East”. We wish her the best and look forward to seeing
her as we all journey forward. Maybe Federation of Families Conference…?

Did you know? Leonardo da Vince was dyslexic and he often wrote backwards.

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Past Editions

Click here for the Spring 2007 Newsletter

Click here for the Winter 2007 Newsletter