Outreach - Center for Community Resources

The organization's overarching goal is to promote the optimal health, safety, education, and financial self-sufficiency of individuals and families who face challenges or barriers.

Our mission is achieved through the following objectives and activities:

Help children and adults succeed by providing evidence-based early childhood education; youth mentoring; adult literacy, life skills, job readiness training, and career assistance.

Improve the well-being of children, youth, and families through evidence-based parenting skills training, intervention for children with special needs, and collaborative case management that increases access to supportive services.

Improve outcomes for highly challenged individuals and families through assessment and service planning; child/family reunification including supervised visitation for children and their non-custodial parents; support for substance and mental health recovery; and transitional services to help court/criminal justice-involved individuals reunite with their families, achieve a healthy lifestyle, gain economic self-sufficiency, and become contributing members of society.

Outreach is a leader in empowering individuals to attain family and economic stability. This is accomplished through a continuum of evidence-based programs and best-practices that help break down systemic barriers that contribute to the generational cycle of poverty.

CHILD/FAMILY STRATEGIES: Certified family development specialists support parents in advancing skills for promoting their child(ren)'s health, safety, and education. Families are strengthened through a variety of parent education workshops, parent-engaged child screenings, pre-K and after-school enrichment, and case management that links families to community resources.

Early Head Start/Parents as Teachers™ for families with children ages 0-5. Evidence-based services include home visits, center-based early learning groups, and parent group connections.

Incredible Years® parent/child series for families with children ages 2-12. Outreach is the region's only certified provider of this evidence-based program.

Guiding Good Choices® evidence-based parent training classes and specialized support groups geared to family bonding and drug/alcohol prevention.

SafeCare Augmented evidence-based parent training program for the prevention of child maltreatment.

Youth Mentoring, tutoring, and enrichment for ages first grade and up.

WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT through the LEAD Center: Group and 1:1 case management strategies help individuals advance toward financial stability, including but not limited to life coaching, job readiness, and evidence-based reentry services. Individuals assisted with career services, interview preparation, customized resumes, career portfolios, and job search assistance.

Responsible Fatherhood – Programming to promote job readiness, responsible parenting, and healthy relationships.

Life Skills/Reintegration Training – Pre- and post-release services for men and women leaving Lackawanna County Prison. Gender-responsive activities designed to minimize the risks of re-incarceration, including risk/need assessments, reentry planning, education in life-change and personal development topics, help with addictions recovery, job readiness, family re-connection, mentoring, and individual case management support.

GED Subject-Specific Tutoring for individuals seeking their GED credential.

COURT-RELATED SERVICES:
Family Reunification – Case management of families with children in out-of-home placement, with the goal to move children into safe, stable home environments.

Access and Supervised Visitation – A service for non-custodial parents who warrant professionally supervised parent-child visits.

Services for Justice-Involved Juveniles.

Treatment Court and Diversion – Specialized case management and mentoring assist high-need women and military veterans toward achieving healthy life goals. Programming addresses parenting and family reunification; addictions recovery; workforce, access to healthcare, housing, and other critical support.

Outreach supports and empowers individuals through the operation and continuing enhancement of its award-winning Seventh Avenue Center. The center is home to Outreach's integrated programming as well as services offered by partner nonprofits, such as Maternal & Family Health Services' Women, Infants & Children (WIC) nutrition program, hospital-sponsored immunization clinics, and other programs that result in our family resource center that serving over 7,500 people per year. Outreach and other Family Centers (statewide and nationally) provide front-line prevention and intervention services to help children and families become healthy, educated, safe, and economically self-sufficient.

Our accessible two-level center is located in central Scranton, near public bus routes. Programs are offered year-round, Monday-Friday including evenings and by appointment. Childcare and transportation are offered for many programs. The welcoming center features training, counseling, and community meeting rooms; an early learning classroom with an outdoor playground; career/computer lab; state-of-the-art supervised visitation rooms for observed parent-child interaction; kitchen, dining area, and free parking, along with staff office space.

Outreach has more than thirty years of experience in successful family self-sufficiency programming and the administration of large state, federal, and foundation grants. The agency has a 16-member policy-making board, a constituent advisory committee, a dedicated cadre of program volunteers, and a multidisciplinary staff of teachers (pre-K through secondary), licensed counselors, case managers, employment specialists, and other experienced professionals, including employees with Spanish fluency. Staff members are trained in best practices and experienced in delivering evidence-based models with fidelity.

Outreach is affiliated with the Pennsylvania Association of Nonprofit Organizations, Pennsylvania's Family Center Network, the PA Family Support Alliance (child protection coalition), and associations related to its areas of practice. (e.g., National Parents as Teachers™ Blue Ribbon Affiliate, Incredible Years®certification, member worldwide Supervised Visitation Network; member of child welfare, criminal justice, housing, veterans, and other coalitions). Outreach is unique in this community and is the sole provider of many of these programs and services in our region. Over the years, we intentionally sought collaborative strategies to engage program participants and meet community needs, building strong relationships across public and private sectors to move today's families forward - because strong families build strong communities.

Established in 1988 as a women's employment program, over time Outreach's Workforce Development services expanded to include welfare-to-work programs, displaced worker training, prisoner reentry services, and other assistance for un- and under-employed workers of all backgrounds.

The organization's Family Center division is rooted in Outreach's Family Matters program, honored as a Governor's model. In the mid-1990s, the agency was specifically selected by county leaders to guide local Family Center (state child/family systems reform), youth risk prevention (Communities That Care), and court/offender reentry initiatives in collaboration with government, schools, and other nonprofit partners. This ongoing role, along with program growth, led to Outreach's development of Seventh Avenue Center, a multifaceted family resource center.

Examples of accomplishments:

Outreach is the largest provider of parenting services in Lackawanna County, offering the region's only certified Incredible Years program. Outreach is the area's designated Family Center.

Successful U.S. Department of Education-funded projects for Youth Mentoring (middle school ages) and Innovative Approaches to Literacy (early learning), led to an ongoing Prenatal-to-Grade Three partnership with Scranton School District.

The agency introduced the region's first career center for dislocated workers. Our weekly Job Group remains the community's only open-to-the-public job search support program.

Evaluation data demonstrated that the organization's award-winning prisoner education/reentry services were very effective in reducing recidivism. Our program serves over 1,800 local prisoners/ year (impacting 2,400 children) and has been featured at state and national conferences.

Looking forward, Outreach will continue vital services to the community through outreach to individuals and families of all backgrounds, active collaboration, and strategic resource development. These cooperative efforts include gathering insight from consumers and outside supporters.

Outreach was part of the national Listen for Good initiative, a two-year project that engaged our program participants in "feedback loops" to compare Outreach's work with that of nonprofit organizations across the nation. Outreach is committed to the evaluation of all programs and continues to obtain feedback from participants.

Outreach will continue to address the community's priority needs by building on recent initiatives. This includes expansion of child/parent home visiting with a new multi-year Pennsylvania Department of Human Services grant; addressing the current opioid crisis through strategies such as gender-responsive recovery groups and Guiding Good Choices® teen drug prevention workshops; and the deployment of other community services that help children, families, and adults thrive.