START Home in Falmouth Gives Troubled Children Some Stability

The Enterprise | 4/24/08

By MICHAEL C. BAILEY

According to Christine M. Lopez, children with significant emotional or behavioral issues sometimes simply do not respond well to the usual approaches.

"Some kids don't do well in an intimate family setting," whether it's their own biological family or a foster family, Ms. Lopez said. "For whatever safety reasons, they can't live with their own family or have problems more intense than can be handled through foster care."

For these children, there is still hope in the form of the Cape START (Short Term Adolescent Residential Treatment) program. Ms. Lopez is the southeast area coordinator for Children's Study Home, which runs the residential group home program for children ages 12 through 18.

The Children's Study Home began life more than a century ago and is one of the state's first social services agencies. Founded by religious leaders in 1865, the Springfield Home for Friendless Women and Children provided, according to the agency's original constitution, "a temporary home for friendless and destitute women and children" as well as employment and job training so they could eventually rebuild their lives.

The organization became the Children's Study Home in the 1940s as it reoriented its mission toward helping children with emotional and behavioral issues. Because of its history, Ms. Lopez said the organization has been able to maintain a substantial endowment that supplements its main source of funding through the Massachusetts Department of Social Services.

"About 80 percent of our funding comes from DSS," she said.

The Children's Study Home established its Cape Cod residential program in 1993, and later opened a "community-based clubhouse model" program in Hyannis.

The Falmouth facility on Gifford Street, an unremarkable but well-kept two-story house, is professionally staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week to serve the needs of up to 13 boys and girls. The home is staffed by 16 people, with one supervisor and three child care workers on-duty during "awake hours," Ms. Lopez said.

Unlike many other youth social service programs, which typically have high staff turnover levels, Ms. Lopez said the Falmouth program has eight staffers who have been with the home for more than nine years each.

Ms. Lopez said a typical resident is a child displaying significant "maladaptive or risk-taking behavior," such as drug or alcohol use, or repeated instances of running away from home. "These are kids who struggle to keep themselves contained, but act out psychologically and social-emotionally.

"Life is generally peaceful at the home, the rare flare-up typically coming from a younger resident dealing with more severe personal problems, Ms. Lopez said. "We'll have months of quiet," she said, "with the occasional `crisis storm.' "

While the home in some ways provides a more relaxed atmosphere, Ms. Lopez said the program "provides a consistency and a stability the kids need...they can focus on working on their emotional issues since everything else is taken care of."

"People sometimes think of us as glorified baby-sitting, but it's not," Ms. Lopez said.

While in residence, the children engage in intensive individual, group, and family therapy, but Ms. Lopez said life at the home is not all about therapy. "We want the kids to realize typical youth milestones" such as getting a part-time job or receiving a driver's license. Many of the residents attend the Falmouth Public Schools while at the home, and are encouraged to get involved with school activities and clubs.

The average stay for a child is nine months, and the goal is to transition the child back into a family setting "if there is an appropriate family resource available," or, for older residents, into an independent living situation. "Permanency is the goal," Ms. Lopez said.

To aid this transition, as well as to provide assistance to at-risk youth needing out-of-home treatment services, Cape START offers the Family Aftercare, Mentoring & Support (FAMS) outreach service. FAMS mentors meet with children and their families or caretakers in their own homes to provide case management, educational assistance, parental support, and medical and transportation services.

For more information, visit the Children's Study Home website at www.studyhome.org.