Community Impact
Parenting Education Services
Families Free provides Parenting Education Services to families with children at risk for going into foster care through a contract with the Tennessee Department of Children's Services. Families Free is only taking referrals through DCS at this time. We hope to have the capacity to serve families we learn about through needs-driven referrals in the near future.
Community Impact Alliance
Families Free has formed a joint collaborative called the Community Impact Alliance with Compass Care Alliance, LLC, and Foundations for Life Principles, LLC. in order to provide additional services to vulnerable families in the Northeast TN region. We are providing the following services:
Therapeutic Family Services
Through this service, CIA will provide families with skill building, teaching and modeling of life concepts, advocacy, and crisis management. This may include: character education, life development, anger management, parent education, drug and alcohol intervention, shoplifting and theft intervention, communication and conflict resolution training, truancy intervention, and resource linkage to other community agencies.
Therapeutic Family Violence Intervention Services
The spectrum of Family Violence Intervention Services includes skill building, teaching and modeling of life concepts, advocacy, crisis management, and conflict reduction/domestic violence training. Based on Family Behavior Therapy, this behavioral treatment aims to reduce family violence and the underlying contributing factors.
Therapeutic Family Visitation Services
The menu of this programming includes a provision of a wide spectrum of services individualized to respond to the needs of the child and family, with an emphasis on flexibility and direct relationship to the needs which will provide the best prospects for family unity/reunification. Parents will receive instructive feedback and guidance concerning each visit. The referring case manager will receive feedback describing the visit, detailing its strengths and needs.
For more information, visit the Community Impact Alliance website here.
____________________________________________________
Who We're Helping:
Meet Felicia...
Families Free was connected with Felicia through our Community Impact program. Felicia is a great example of who we’re helping…and why. Felicia was referred to us by the Department of Children’s Services. At the time our staff got involved in her life, she was living in a camper with her three children. She had previously been in jail for 3 years, and was having trouble getting a job (with a felony on her record). Naturally, she was having a hard time getting her life back on track.
How Families Free Helps…As case manager, one of the first steps Lisa took was to help Felicia get into housing through the Interfaith Hospitality Network. Felicia credits this with helping her get stability back into her life. She states that it is helping her save money as she seeks a new job. She has experienced kindness through the various churches and volunteers at IHN. And, she has been pleased that IHN makes no false promises – everything they promise, they have delivered.
Felicia has also worked with Diane through a parenting curriculum, which she says is helping her know how to communicate with and effectively manage her children. Felicia also says that the simple friendship she has felt from Lisa, Diane, and Vicki has truly helped her out. She recalls a simple, but memorable few moments at a book store one day after a mental health appointment with Lisa. She says that the loneliness of her situation has made things worse…but the relationships she is building through Families Free is helping her get back on track.
Felicia “appreciates everything Families Free has done” for her. She looks forward to finding a job, permanent housing, and continuing be involved with Families Free and IHN throughout this process.
Meet Roxanne...
Through a referral from a local agency, Families Free began helping a family caught up in the cycles of incarceration. Roxanne was a mother of three children, ages 3, 7 and 13. Her husband recently re-entered prison and left Roxanne and her children in a vulnerable situation. When Roxanne’s father died, she could no longer manage on her own. Families Free was asked to assist Roxanne in addressing some of her most immediate needs – shut-off notices on her water and electricity. We also linked her with resources to repair and make her home livable for the winter. By connecting Roxanne to these resources, we hoped to strengthen this family unit. Our goal was to enable them to overcome these challenges so that they can move forward into a healthier, more productive living.
