Jul/Aug 2001

Marilyn Jones, SOS Coordinator
Phone: (541) 523-6423 ext. 232
E-mail: marilyn.jones@state.or.us

BACKGROUND: Baker SD Superintendent Toni Hardman contacted Todd Siex, Services to Children and Families (SCF) Manager in Baker City to request social service workers at each school site to help at-risk children and families. Because of limited resources, SCF could not provide case workers for each school. Toni and Todd started looking at creating a site program that could be done within the budget. They brought in community partners and started the School Site One Stop steering committee. Marilyn Jones, a social worker from SCF, was hired as the School Site One Stop Coordinator and is in charge of the program. 

For a "snapshot" testimonial of how this program helped two students, check out Success Stories.

HOW IT’S EVOLVING: SOS is divided among four phases. Phase one began during the 2000 - 2001 school year in three elementary schools. Phase two will expand this year to Churchill, Haines and Keating elementary schools. Phase three will include Baker Middle school and phase four will expand to Baker High School. SOS was funded as a grant from the Oregon Department of Human Services for October 2000 to June 2002.

WHY IT BEGAN: Baker schools have many children with problems attending school: family disruptions and dysfunction, defiant behavior, physical aggression, poor hygiene and learning disabilities. While the problems aren’t severe enough for formal intervention by SCF staff, these children and their families needed help. One child could keep a classroom of children from learning, keep a teacher from giving other children attention and keep school counselors and administrators busy for hours. Yet there were no services available to this child or support available to the school faculty.

RESEARCH SUPPORTING THE NEED: SOS is one of the county’s only prevention programs aimed at early intervention for children and families. This service addresses Baker County’s Juvenile Five-Year Strategic Plan priority outcomes and actions, which include:

• Identifying at-risk home-schooled children;
• Creating effective identification and assessment tools to identify at-risk youth;
• Identification and assessment of victims of child neglect, criminal non-support, endangering the welfare of minors, abandonment and incest;
• Timely mental health services;
• And services for troubled youth that do not meet detention criteria. 

This program also addresses the Baker County Comprehensive Plan’s goals to support the healthy growth and development of its children, create readiness for school and educational success, prevent juvenile crime and collaborate with the community.

HOW SOS WORKS: SOS gives at-risk students facing many issues a "NO Wrong Door Approach." Each school has a team of community partners who meet weekly at the school to help these children and their families. Community partners offer many services, including counseling, housing, medical care, in-home services, food assistance and day care. The focus of SOS is prevention and early intervention. 

• FUNDING: SOS is being funded by the Department of Human Services Community Partnership Team for the first two years. Other funding streams are being identified now for the 2003 school year. 
• EFFECT ON STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT: This program has provided resources previously unavailable to the schools as well as to children and their families. Weekly tracking is done by the SOS coordinator and data is charted and analyzed on the progress. The following is an overview of the data collected:
  • Child’s issues: absenteeism, family compliance, defiant behavior, physical aggression, poor hygiene and learning disabilities.
  • Meetings: Staffings (meeting regarding the child), unified case management meetings, unified case plans, and re-staffings (meeting on a child a second time)
  • Partners who offered Services: How many services each of our team members performed.

Here is a small sample of the data we collected last year:

CAN SOS BE DUPLICATED? Absolutely, the SOS coordinator has been mentoring Umatilla and Morrow in the development of the SOS project in their counties which will be starting in the Fall of 2001. The SOS coordinator has also just received some additional funding so she will be able to mentor other counties as well.

MEASURING FUTURE SUCCESS: We will continue to collect our data which is showing a reduction in absenteeism, a reduction in aggressive behavior, and an increase of family participation. This coming year we will also be tracking academics. We received two wonderful letters of support, one from The Honorable Gregory L. Baxter, Circuit Judge, the other from Todd Siex, SCF Branch Manager.  Mr. Siex said "I am certain that we have averted several high risk children having to go through our front doors by simply providing prevention consultation before a crisis comes up in the family." He goes on to say, "I hope it becomes a way of doing business among all our human services partners here in Baker County." The Honorable Gregory L. Baxter said "Simply put, I have been shocked by the absence of dependency cases...The only major change that I am aware of is the establishment of the SOS program." He goes on to say, "The greatest impact on the court’s caseload is the tremendous work done by the men and women involved in the SOS program. I hope that the program continues and that we continue to see the absence of the need for the court to get involved in dependency cases."

ANYTHING ELSE TO ADD? School Site One Stop is a wonderful project that we could talk about all day. There is always something new being added to the SOS program such as, an offshoot program called the Summer Fun Program. This program allows our high risk and financially disadvantaged children to be involved in summer activities which allow them to keep busy and out of trouble. It also allows us to keep an eye on our highest needs children who may otherwise be at risk of abuse or neglect in the home.

Two success stories  [Top]

Learning to communicate: A school counselor referred a seriously troubled fourth grade boy and his family to SOS. He had a history of being non-verbal, with learning disabilities. The mother had also reported domestic violence. The lead case worker is the school counselor. Because of the counselor’s diligence, this child has gone from one word verbal exchanges to using sentences. Sending the boy on "verbal errands" turned out to be a great idea. He was sent to the office to ask for supplies, or to the cafeteria and see what was on the menu for lunch. This child is now starting to play with other children and will interact with adults. What was the benefit of SOS? Having the SOS partners working together as a team, we were able to give the school a good strong history of the family. This helped the school when they needed to make decisions regarding this child and the child’s family. The following agencies were able to give information and support to the school: the Juvenile Department, Adult and Family Services and Services to Children and Families.

Settling down the anger: Another child - also referred to SOS by the school counselor - had extreme behavior problems in the classroom. The child’s mother said she needed help with her own anger. This family has had two meetings about staff to be assigned, and how to manage the over-all situation (Case Management). The school counselor was chosen to be the lead case worker because of his relationship with the child. The counselor placed this child in the ABLE (Alternative Building Learning Environment) program and has been working closely with him. The school offered space for the child’s mental health counselor to work with this child at the school because of transportation issues for the mom. Mom and dad are back together and are attending regular counseling sessions with a family therapist. The therapist will include the child and start family counseling just as soon as he feels the family is ready. The school will meet with the parents and the therapist to help this child enter normal classroom activities. Adult and Family Services checked on medical benefits for the child to help with the cost of the counseling. Services to Children and Families offered the family IHBS (Intensive Home Based Services) to help mom get the child under control at home. After the meeting, mom was feeling more empowered and wanted to wait before accepting that service.