Service Navigation, Support Critical to Babies’ Success

First-time mom Judeline and her three-year-old son Amari legally immigrated to the United States a year ago to escape the escalating violence in her home country that claimed her husband’s life. After her initial sponsorship fell through, Judeline arrived at FamilyAid’s Brookline temporary housing in August, exhausted, hungry, and scared.

Judeline is a devoted mother and wants the best for Amari. After her immediate needs were addressed at the shelter and she settled Amari into a routine, Judeline agreed to undertake a healthy baby assessment conducted by FamilyAid’s case managers through its early childhood education navigation program.

The assessment indicated that Amari was not reaching his milestones and seemed to have trouble with his vision. Judeline had believed that the delays were a result of their months of travel under tremendous stress. But after conferring with the agency’s Early Childhood Navigator, Rosangela Fuentes, Judeline’s case manager helped her enroll Amari in an early intervention program that provides free services to families with young children experiencing developmental delays. Amari was eventually diagnosed with autism, and the program’s specialist began providing the physical, occupational, and vision therapy he needs to reach his full potential.

In consultation with the specialist and Fuentes, FamilyAid also made modifications to Judeline’s room at the shelter to ensure Amari was getting the visual stimulation and other supports needed to address his disabilities.

Judeline is overjoyed to see Amari making progress. He smiles more often, is catching up with some of his milestones, and his vision is slowly improving. As Judeline inches toward permanent resident status, she is working with her FamilyAid housing specialist and employment navigator to secure a job and stable housing. She’s determined to provide Amari with the best possible future.

Amari is just one of more than 2,500 children under 18 FamilyAid will serve this year, with more than 700 of our children ages 0-5. Combined with our case managers and housing specialists, a growing team of service navigators is key to implementing FamilyAid’s two-generational approach to ending family homelessness. Navigators create bridges between families experiencing homelessness and the services, supports, and resources children and parents need to thrive by identifying and sharing those resources with case managers.

And rather than duplicating services, FamilyAid navigators are developing formal partnerships with leading community service providers in six key resource areas identified by the Aspen Institute’s Ascend Network as being critical to family self-sufficiency: early education;  K-12 education; economic empowerment; post-secondary employment and education; health & well-being; and social capital.  They then connect case managers who help their clients enroll in and utilize the specific supportive services they need to achieve long-term well-being.

“More families are coming to us who don’t have the community connections and resources they need to get back up on their feet quickly,” said FamilyAid Vice President for Programs Carla Richards. “In addition to providing shelter and housing and case management services, we are morally compelled to ensure that every child and parent in our care can also access every resource they need to be healthy and happy.”

With few public sources for critical navigation services, a growing list of FamilyAid funders – including Clipper Ship Foundation, Lynch Foundation, Cummings Foundation, Rockland Trust, TD Charitable Foundation, PwC Charitable Foundation, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation  – are stepping up to help the agency build out a 12-member navigation team, one each for children and parents, in each of the aforementioned areas, to support more than 12,000 children and parents over the next three years.