Passing of one of our Senior Community Service Employment Program workers

We are saddened by the sudden passing of one of our Senior Community Service Employment Program workers, Sandra (Sandy) Greathouse recently. She had four children, and 11 grand children. She endeared herself to many around our work site with her cheer and comraderie, while participating in our bustling work setting, doing many varied clerical tasks.

Mentoring/ Volunteers Recruitment event

Saturday, September 12th, some of the staff will participate in a fair at St. Margaret Mary's parish hall (the old YWCA) to recruit volunteers. The fair runs from 10 am to 4 pm. We undoubtedly will have an enthusiastic contingent of staff willing to participate as we gear up our WE CAN program, our VISTA mentoring program, and the general recruitment of volunteers, and community supporters that all our site's services and programs appreciate.

Next Thursday: site wide quarterly planning and communication meeting

Next Thursday, September 3rd (can it be September already???) at 10 am we will have a site meeting, where we go over some internal communication information(for such a big, ambitious and bustling site!!!!) and review the site's strategic plan, in light of the agency's strategic plan, and the efforts earlier in the year to set some goals.

Welcome to new staff in the after school program, as school gears up!!

We welcome Katrina Nelson, Lora Phillips, and Jessica Martin, as new relief Youth Care Workers in the Mid Town Family Resource Center, after school program at McKinley with today's start of school. Lisa and Shauna will guide them into the mission and programming of the program over these first few days. All three bring their own unique strengths and interests to the program; we look forward to another exciting and effective year of serving the children, the families and the school with our quality after school program.

Welcoming our new WE CAN coordinator to the job!

Today (more or less) begins Ashley Way's new job with the agency, of Parkersburg's WE CAN coordinator. Ashley is attending the training and orientation for new WE CAN coordinator's from around the agency in Charleston. When she returns, she will be ready to begin the work of recruiting mentors, and spreading the word about the program in the Parkersburg area. Accompanying Ashley to the training are Shelley Plauche, site manager, and Missy Storey, VISTA volunteer with our mentors for transitioning youth program. Ashley has been working with the after school program for several months, as well as doing some foster care aide work, with transportation and visitation, so she's had a great orientation to the agency, and a whirlwind tour of some of the exciting programming here at Parkersburg. She assisted with the Americana Music Festival this summer (and has great promotion, PR and marketing ideas!!) and has been working on a Parkersburg Area Community Foundation grant application for the foster care program.

The day before Wood County schools start back up!

This was a busy day around the Mid Town Family Resource Center. We were conducting interviews for additional youth care worker (relief) staff, and people were dropping in to say hello and for various reasons all day long.
Chuck, a former volunteer in the after school program, and former extern from Mountain State College (he had gone back to school after being displaced at a factory job) stopped by to say hello; and we encouraged him to come back and volunteer now that he is retired.
Heather, a mother of three from the neighborhood stopped by seeking some school clothes for the boys. We encouraged her to submit an entry in our neighborhood writing contest.
Charles, one of our Senior Employment workers, bustled through taking care of janitorial work and handyman jobs. Deb brought another woman through, a prospect from the same Senior Employment program. Lora, a college student who volunteered in the after school program all last year, and who is now one of the relief youth care workers we are hiring for this school year, came in to fill in some hiring paperwork.
Ashley, our new WE CAN coordinator was working on a local foundation's grant application.
Christina, a stalwart mother of three who has participated in our program, served on an advisory committee, served on our safety committee, stopped by on her way to get some school supplies, and told of her boys (the twins) getting ready for middle school tomorrow.
Andrew, finishing up a third week volunteering, helped take things over to the school such as recreation equipment and supplies, and organized the remnants of the Tinkers program in our new out building.
Lisa, our Runaway and Homeless Youth TLP worker, brought a girl interested in doing some volunteer work in the after school program by to fill out an application and meet with Lisa W.
Several people prepared food boxes from our newly organized food pantry, and several more looked through clothes from our closet for school starting up tomorrow.

Today's Transitioning to Adulthood life skills fair

The VISTA's and transitional living (Runaway and Homeless Youth) staff organized a life skills "fair" today for young people transitioning to adulthood. They had done a good job of planning and arranging this 4 hour event. Unfortunately the turnout was disappointing!!! So, our hard working team had to re-group and shift gears- but they remain undaunted in their efforts to advocate for young people in this transition to adulthood. Missy is gearing up for her recruiting of mentors for youth in the target population, and will attend the agency's orientation for new WE CAN coordinators next week. We say good by next week to Kindra after her year of service to VISTA- she will be missed, and remembered fondly for her spunk and spirit; and we hope she stays involved here, as she starts college out at WVU-P. Patty is playing host this weekend, to another VISTA, Memory Cooper, who is with Mission WV in Putnam County, working on a similar VISTA project as our Missy Storey. So we hope to see a lot of good partnering between the two projects this coming year.