NEBRASKA CHILDRENS HOME SOCIETY INC

The program is equipped to help children grow emotionally, socially and academically in preparation for school readiness and long-term wellness outcomes.

The program utilizes the Creative Curriculum®, a research and evidence based early childhood curriculum, and the Teaching Strategies Gold Assessment® system, which focus on research based objectives for development and learning with demonstrated successful outcomes related to school readiness in the areas of physical, language, social/emotional and cognitive development.

Early Childhood STEMstart provides a unique, high-quality experience in which children engage through a variety of activities including hands-on classroom programs implementing specialized equipment and educational field trips to kindle an early understanding and appreciation for science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Family involvement is a key component of the program. Families are encouraged to attend field trips, family conferences, participate in activities, eat lunch with their child, or stop by to visit whenever they are available. The teaching staff works with families to facilitate consistency in every aspect of the child’s development by sharing the child’s daily experiences and providing educational materials and activities for home. Special activities are scheduled throughout the year for families to participate with their child. In addition, the families are provided with appropriate resources and referrals as needed.

The Nature Explore outdoor classroom promotes development and learning in social-emotional, physical, language and literacy and cognitive development in a natural setting. The playground provides natural experiences that help kids discover new things about themselves and the world around them through experimentation, observation, problem solving, and manipulation.

As funding is available, Early Education Scholarships provide tuition assistance to families with limited resources to enroll their child.

An array of services are provided to care for the specific and individualized needs of each child. Specialists ensure that each child receives support from family members and foster parents regarding identity development. NCHS believes it is in the best interests of the child to keep siblings together unless otherwise indicated.

Components of the Foster Care program include the following:
1. Foster Parent Recruitment, Screening and Selection
2. Foster Parent Training
3. Matching and Placement of Children
4. Service Planning
5. On-going Support and Oversight
6. Developing and Maintaining Connections
7. Communication with Parents

Kinship Care, the fulltime care of children by relatives or anyone to who a family member is ascribed, includes a variety of services, information and referrals to support the stability and success of kinship caregivers, children and their families. Kinship care builds on the strengths of family relationships and ensures children’s continued connections to their family networks and community supports while recognizing that the entire family may need a variety of services.

NCHS Permanency Services uses the Family Finding® model using the six step method created by Kevin Campbell to find connections, and possibly permanency, for foster children with a concurrent plan, which is an approach that involves considering all reasonable options for permanency at the earliest possible point following a child's entry into foster care or a plan of adoption. Permanency planning is a child-centered process that aims to ensure children have enduring relationships, of the social and legal status of family membership, that last a lifetime and support their connections with extended family, cultures and communities of origin. The Family Finding® model offers methods and strategies to locate and engage relatives of children currently living in foster care. The goal of Family Finding® is to unite each child with a family, so that every child may benefit from the lifelong connections that only a family provides.

Additionally, the 3-5-7 Model© is an evidence-informed relational model used to provide therapeutic and emotional support to foster children, families and caregivers. Specialist provide support throughout the process to help the child through separation and loss, the grieving process, developmental growth stages, relationship building through attachment activities, trauma influenced behaviors, family and organizational systems to prepare them for permanency and the transition into a permanent home. The 3-5-7 Model© provides tools for staff to support and empower individuals to develop relationships that will be secure and sustainable.

Adoption Planning is a statewide service since the organization’s founding in 1893. The program is child centered and focuses on the best interest of the child. Information and ongoing support is provided so the mother and father may make decisions and develop a plan that they believe is best for their child and for themselves.

Parents considering adoption for their child are able to select a family from the group of approved prospective adoptive parents in the program who have an approved home study and have completed required training on issues related to parenting and adoption. Specialists provide information on open adoption and the research that supports this is in the best interest of children. NCHS is committed to the understanding that the experience of adoption has lifelong implications for all involved and may impact them in different ways. A parent who is considering adoption for their child is offered the opportunity to meet with other birth parents and attend a birth parent support group. Parents who choose adoption for their child are also provided with ongoing lifelong support after they make their adoption plan. Birth parent support groups are offered, as well as celebrations to honor birth mothers on or around Birth Mother's Day. Every other year a retreat is offered to birth mothers as another means of providing ongoing support.

Options Education is provided to individuals/couples who have an open case with Division of Children and Family Services to educate them on relinquishment terminology, which includes the differences between voluntary relinquishment and involuntary termination of parental rights, as well as their options as the legal parent, and possible outcomes. NCHS staff are trained to educate parents in a supportive, unbiased manner.

Adoptive parent services focus on the high importance of providing education, necessary resources, information and support for the many challenges and joys of the adoption process. Families interested in adopting a child are first invited to attend introductory educational classes where information is provided and the screening process begins. To prepare adoptive couples, attendance is required at parenting and adoption education classes. A home study is required which is an assessment of a family and their readiness to become parents through adoption. A home study consists of several interviews with a couple both together and individually and visits to their home.

Provide comprehensive lifelong support for members of the adoption circle (the adopted person, birth family and adoptive family), including assistance to help individuals and families identify and develop skills to deal with issues that are adoption specific, separate adoption issues from normal developmental challenges, and address the interface of adoption and behavioral health issues.

Search Services are available to any member of the adoption circle, where a previous relationship occurred with NCHS. Post Adoption Specialists provide information, education and support on the issues of searching, reunification, grief and loss, and other areas.

Self-sufficiency services are designed to support parents/caregivers to have improved life situations and needed skills to be self-sufficient and then in turn better able focus on nurturing and caring for their child/ren.

Services are flexible and strengths-based with one-on-one support, and includes assistance with housing, budgeting, employment, educational attainment and basic needs (food, shelter, safety) while teaching, supporting, and empowering parents/caregivers with the tools to achieve their personal goals.

Services are in place to address the many and varied barriers, which allows families, to receive needed services in a connected way, rather than disjointed. Specialists serve as a resource and point-of-contact to prevent families from homelessness, avoid eviction, provide and/or connect to basic needs, including medical care.

Raising Your Grandchildren is a 6-week psychoeducation series focused on providing support, resources and parenting strategies to grandparents. The program addresses the challenges of parenting traumatized children and feelings of guilt, regret and grief over the difficulties that led to the situation. The program is also available in Spanish. Topics covered:
• blessings, losses, and challenges
• nurturing self and child
• child growth and development
• appropriate behavioral expectations
• keeping children secure and safe
• expanding awareness of grandparents' own needs and the resources to get those needs met.

Series graduates can become members of the Ambassadors ongoing support group. Ambassadors meet twice a month and cover additional topics like preventing child sexual abuse and learning how to advocate for themselves and their families.