Youth Input About Mental Health Services Needed!

The message below comes from the director of the Children’s Bureau at the state Office of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services.  To sum it up, the state wants to know what youth think about services they are getting for mental health and “behavioral” issues.

The two main questions are in BOLD below and responses should be submitted by April 12, 2010.  If you want to leave your response as a comment to the blog, we’ll submit them in one large bundle on the 12th.

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OMHSAS is gathering input for the “Call for Change,” a strategic plan for quality, effective behavioral health services for children and their families.  This effort is similar to the successful Call for Change that earlier helped transform the adult system.

The Call for Change will build on the research literature, on an analysis of the current system, input from systems partners, and on past efforts such as the Mercer review of family based and evidence based practice, the OMHSAS/OCYF Residential work group, and the OMHSAS Children’s Retreat.

The plan will also incorporate the implications of the SAMHSA System of Care Grant, which will develop systems of care in 15 counties to serve youth age 8-18 that have serious behavioral health needs and are involved in child welfare or juvenile justice, especially those that are in or at risk for residential placement.

We are seeking the input of organizations and individuals that have insight into strengths and weaknesses of the children’s behavioral health system.  One means of gathering input is to ask for a written response to the following two questions:

1.       What is your overall impression of the publicly funded system of children’s behavioral health services in Pennsylvania?

2.       What are the areas for improvement?

Would you please ask youth and young adults to provide us with input on these two questions?  If you are able to provide input by April 12^th, we will use that input to inform the draft that will be prepared for public review starting at the May 5^th OMHSAS Advisory Committee meeting.  That Draft will be sent to you, and there will be more opportunity for you to provide additional input.

Please let me know if you have any questions; I look forward to receiving your response.

Stan Mrozowski

smrozowski@state.pa.us

On-line Chat Testing

Hey everyone,

We’ve completed our first on-line chat test.  We used Skype, Tiny Chat, and Tok Box.  We’ve decided to do a more in depth trial of Tok Box for next week.  This meeting is open to all members of our state-wide advisory board.  

We hope to begin having regular chats that are open to general youth input once we hammer out the bugs, so keep your eyes peeled for the roll out!

Begin within,

Michael

“Children broken by the world become the adults most likely to change it,”

~Frank Warren, founder of Post Secret

Youth On-line Chats

Hey all,

We’re going to be piloting some organizational chat sessions for the Youth Outreach Union.  These will serve to keep the advisory committee on task in between quarterly meetings in State College.  They will also be an open opportunity for any registered member of the Youth Outreach Union to partcipate in discussion about where the union is going and what is coming up for youth in Pennsylvania.

We will be using Skype(r) to host the chats.  If you currently use Skype and want to participate in a chat, please pass along your Skype username so that we can add you to the chat list.

Chats will be held every other Tuesday, beginning March 9, 2010 at 6:30pm.

Hope to see you there!

Begin within,

Michael

“Children broken by the world become the adults most likely to change it,”

~Frank Warren, founder of Post Secret