by North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center | Mar 26, 2019 | In The Media
Suzanne Martin, Youth Employment Specialist at the Guidance Center (left), with National Grid’s Sarah Kahrs and Paula Gendreau.
North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center and National Grid held the second event in their new partnership as two National Grid employees generously donated their time and expertise to coach students in the Mock Interview Day at Nassau B.O.C.E.S. High School in Wantagh.
At this special annual event, more than 150 interviews were conducted, with employees from National Grid, East Meadow Public Library and other organizations speaking with students individually as if they were on an actual job interview.
“The Mock Interview Day is an invaluable experience for students to practice their communication and social skills,” said Suzanne Martin, youth employment counselor at the Guidance Center’s Intensive Support Program at Nassau B.O.C.E.S., where students receive intensive mental health services on site. “It helps them learn how to present their best selves and realize that first impressions do matter when you’re looking for a job.”
“This event was an incredible experience,” said Sarah Kahrs, U.S. performance excellence coach at National Grid and one of the volunteer interviewers. “It was so exciting to be able to take an active role in helping these young adults prepare for their future. In spite of the students coming in a bit nervous, I was so impressed by how prepared they were.”
Paula Gendreau, National Grid senior supervisor of operations, also enjoyed her experience coaching the students. “Volunteering was such a great opportunity,” she said. “I was impressed by all the positive energy. I was fortunate to meet some great candidates, and it was my pleasure to be a part of a wonderful event.”
Martin said while most of the students were initially very anxious, they felt very accomplished and proud after their interviews. “A lot of students thought they didn’t do well, but they got great feedback from their interviewers,” she said. “It’s a real boost for their self-esteem, and we’re so grateful to National Grid and all the participants for their role in making this event such a huge success.”
The event was the second of several that the Guidance Center has planned in partnership with National Grid. “We work with many organizations across Long Island and in NYC helping to prepare students for their future,” said Kathleen Wisnewski, National Grid customer and community manager. “We’re excited about our partnership with the Guidance Center, and we look forward to more events.”
About North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center:
As the preeminent not-for-profit children’s mental health agency on Long Island, North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center is dedicated to restoring and strengthening the emotional well-being of children (from birth – age 24) and their families.
National Grid is an electricity, natural gas and clean energy delivery company serving more than 20 million people through our networks in New York, Massachusetts and Rhode Island. It is the largest distributor of natural gas in the Northeast.
by North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center | Mar 26, 2019 | Press Releases
Volunteers offer their expertise and generosity at annual Mock Interview Day
Roslyn Heights, NY, March 25, 2019 — On March 22, 2019, North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center and National Grid held the second event in their new partnership as two National Grid employees generously donated their time and expertise to coach students in the Mock Interview Day at Nassau B.O.C.E.S. High School in Wantagh.
At this special annual event, more than 150 interviews were conducted, with employees from National Grid, East Meadow Public Library and other organizations speaking with students individually as if they were on an actual job interview.
“The Mock Interview Day is an invaluable experience for students to practice their communication and social skills,” said Suzanne Martin, Youth Employment Counselor at the Guidance Center’s Intensive Support Program at Nassau B.O.C.E.S., where students receive intensive mental health services on site. “It helps them learn how to present their best selves and realize that first impressions do matter when you’re looking for a job.”
“This event was an incredible experience,” said Sarah Kahrs, US Performance Excellence Coach at National Grid and one of the volunteer interviewers. “It was so exciting to be able to take an active role in helping these young adults prepare for their future. In spite of the students coming in a bit nervous, I was so impressed by how prepared they were.”
Paula Gendreau, National Grid Senior Supervisor of Operations, also enjoyed her experience coaching the students. “Volunteering was such a great opportunity,” she said. “I was impressed by all the positive energy! I was fortunate to meet some great candidates, and it was my pleasure to be a part of a wonderful event.”
Martin said that, while most of the students were initially very anxious, they felt very accomplished and proud after their interviews. “A lot of students thought they didn’t do well, but they got great feedback from their interviewers,” she said. “It’s a real boost for their self-esteem, and we’re so grateful to National Grid and all the participants for their role in making this event such a huge success.”
The event was the second of several that the Guidance Center has planned in partnership with National Grid. “We work with many organizations across Long Island and in NYC helping to prepare students for their future,” said Kathleen Wisnewski, National Grid Customer and Community Manager. “We’re excited about our partnership with the Guidance Center, and we look forward to more events.”
Suzanne Martin, Youth Employment Specialist at the Guidance Center (left), with National Grid’s Sarah Kahrs and Paula Gendreau.
About North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center:
As the preeminent not-for-profit children’s mental health agency on Long Island, North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center is dedicated to restoring and strengthening the emotional well-being of children (from birth – age 24) and their families. Our highly trained staff of psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, vocational rehabilitation counselors and other mental health professionals lead the way in diagnosis, treatment, prevention, training, parent education, research and advocacy. The Guidance Center helps children and families address issues such as depression and anxiety; developmental delays; bullying; teen pregnancy; sexual abuse; teen drug and alcohol abuse; and family crises stemming from illness, death, trauma and divorce. For more than 65 years, the Guidance Center has been a place of hope and healing, providing innovative and compassionate treatment to
all who enter our doors, regardless of their ability to pay. For more information about the Guidance Center, visit www.northshorechildguidance.org or call (516) 626-1971.
About National Grid:
National Grid (LSE: NG; NYSE: NGG) is an electricity, natural gas and clean energy delivery company serving more than 20 million people through our networks in New York, Massachusetts and Rhode Island. We are the largest distributor of natural gas in the Northeast. National Grid also operates the systems that deliver gas and electricity across Great Britain. National Grid is transforming our electricity and natural gas networks with smarter, cleaner and more resilient energy solutions to meet the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent by 2050. Our Northeast 80×50 Pathway is an industry leading analysis for how to reach that goal in the states we serve, focusing on the power generation, heat and transportation sectors.
Read more about the innovative projects across our footprint in The Democratization of Energy, an eBook written by National Grid’s U.S. president, Dean Seavers. For more information, please visit our website, follow us on Twitter, watch us on YouTube, friend us on Facebook and find our photos on Instagram.
by North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center | Mar 26, 2019 | In The Media
In New York’s Nassau County, a broad portrait of healthy suburbia masks disparities that lie at the local level.
GARDEN CITY, N.Y. – On the surface, Nassau County is a wealthy and thriving suburban enclave in New York City’s backyard.
Home to 1.4 million people and one of two independent counties on Long Island, it’s the picture of community well-being: The area is relatively safe, the unemployment rate is fairly low and most people have health coverage. In U.S. News’ 2019 Healthiest Communities rankings – a project evaluating nearly 3,000 counties across myriad measures of health, housing, economy and more – Nassau County places 96th overall.
That’s the Nassau County many residents know. But further scrutiny reveals stark disparities at the ZIP code level, making it clear that health challenges traditionally thought of as city problems – like pollution, poverty and access to care – can transcend city limits and spill over into suburban rings.
“From the 20,000-foot level, we have one of the wealthiest and healthiest suburbs in America,” says Lawrence Levy, executive dean of Hofstra University‘s National Center for Suburban Studies. “But the closer you get to the ground, the more you realize the unrecognized disparities.
“I am in a community where quality and outcomes in health care are terrific, whereas there are neighborhoods and villages cheek to jowl where you could be in the inner city,” Levy says. “Much of the country (has) fallen victim to this myth of wealth and wellness in the suburbs.”
This longstanding dichotomy can also be found elsewhere: Among America’s 100 most populous metro areas in 2015, more people lived in poverty in the suburbs than in the major cities nearby, according to an analysis presented to Congress by Elizabeth Kneebone, then a senior fellow with the Brookings Institution. A lack of mass transit and fragmented government resources can exacerbate the issue.
But Nassau County – sometimes called the birthplace of post-World War II suburbia – offers a clear example of how a sweeping area assessment can mask neighborhood problems. For example, while census estimates say just 6.2 percentof residents live in poverty, the county’s cost of living is significantly higher than in most of the country, and those struggling to make ends meet have largely been relegated to a handful of neighborhoods.
Community boundaries draw visible lines. In the county hamlet of Merrick, about 88 percent of the approximately 22,000 residents are white, and the median household income is $147,572, according to census estimates. But in neighboring Roosevelt, a 1.77-square-mile hamlet that’s home to a little over 16,000 people, roughly half of public school students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, a marker of community poverty. About 98 percent of residents are black or Hispanic.
Half a century after redlining and racial discrimination in housing were banned in the U.S., Nassau County remains one of the most racially segregated of America’s large communities, Healthiest Communities and other data indicate. The legacy of such practices has been documented across the country: Affected communities often lack access to quality housing, jobs, schools and health care, resulting in poorer health outcomes.
“Racial residential segregation is a fundamental cause of health disparities across the board,” says Martine Hackett, an assistant professor and public health researcher at Hofstra University. “If you take that concept – of the outside environment playing a role in the differences on a population level – then the way that looks and presents as the health outcomes of people in suburban areas is going to have a different flavor.”
For example, in Nassau County, black babies are about 3.5 times as likely as white babies to die before their first birthday – a slightly harsher disparity than in New York City, where the poverty rate and uninsured rate are higher. Infant mortality serves as a strong indicator of the health of a population overall, public health experts say, since it’s tied to socioeconomic status, health care access and health care quality – all factors that can be influenced by the structural racism shown to exist in health care.
A community health assessment conducted by the Nassau County Department of Health in 2016 identified nine of the county’s communities, including Roosevelt, as areas where “population pockets are disproportionately burdened with a poorer health status,” which can be borne out by shorter life expectancies, higher disease prevalence and less accessible health care. Some problems vary by neighborhoodand demographics, but taken together, the nine communities generally have significantly higher rates of asthma, type 2 diabetes, liver disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease than the rest of the county, according to the assessment.
Sexually transmitted infections also are more prevalent in the nine communities, and Nassau County, combined with neighboring Suffolk County, is one of the only suburban areas in the country to receive federal funding through the Ryan White HIV/AIDS program, authorized in 1990 to provide access to health care for low-income people living with HIV.
Local funding to address such health problems is scarce, however, and while underserved communities in Nassau County have advocated for more attention and resources in recent years, progress has come slowly in some arenas and been stagnant in others.
For example, the county helped pay for programs that supported pregnant teenagers and teenage parents in the village of Westbury for decades. But within the last few years, the county has stopped funding all but one such program – Good Beginnings for Babies – which has seen its funding reduced while need has grown, says Nellie Taylor-Walthrust, who leads the initiative for the North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center, a local counseling agency.
Good Beginnings is now the only program to receive discretionary funding through the health department, which saw its budget slashed by roughly $39 million between 2009 and 2018.
Many school districts also have been hesitant to address mental health and substance use issues among students, Taylor-Walthrust says. “Working with our local community leaders, it’s almost like you have to navigate: Who will listen to what I have to say?” she says. “I think there needs to be a meeting of the minds.”
If historical policies and a clouded view of communities in need have perpetuated some health disparities, Nassau County’s sheer number of villages and public school districts – 56 for roughly 201,000 students – has further fragmented the region, isolating communities that are wealthier, healthier and typically whiter and preventing them from seeing their neighbors’ challenges.
“In my experience, when I point it out to people, they are surprised – all the time – because they had no idea, no realization, even living in these neighborhoods,” Hackett says. “If people don’t know that it’s happening, nobody is going to do anything about it.”
Awareness is a key first step to improving the health of underserved communities, local advocates say, but it’s hardly sufficient.
Northwell Health, the largest hospital system in New York and a major employer in the area, started deploying community interventions to improve health equity in Nassau County in recent years, including by offering “prescriptions” for healthy food to hospital patients who have a diet-related health issue and training community health workers, who are then employed by local organizations and help residents navigate the web of care and services they may need.
“We’ve been seeing there is a gap between where the community is and where social services and health care providers are,” says Nuzhat Quaderi, who manages Northwell’s community health worker program. “We recognize that we’re not the expert in this grassroots, in-the-community work. So how do we build this bridge and create liaisons within the community?”
Dr. Lawrence Eisenstein, Nassau County’s health commissioner, says his health department seeks to provide information and ensure access to services that are available through the region’s many community-based groups, federally qualified health centers, hospitals, school districts and other organizations. The health department also works with the Long Island Health Collaborative – which has roughly 100 community partners across Nassau and Suffolk counties – to compile data, share resources and promote best practices to improve health. The Nassau County Department of Health does not provide clinical services itself.
“It’s all about communication and identifying ways to level the playing field where we see these disparities,” Eisenstein says. “When possible, we try and gear our initiatives toward impacting at-risk communities.”
Still, some advocates have expressed concern about county leaders’ willingness to take on the area’s broader health disparities – and their underlying causes – in a timely and adequate manner. With so many levels of oversight between the county and its dozens of villages, school districts and even water districts, it can be difficult to know who’s responsible for certain issues, creating a “disconnect” between community members and their government leaders, says Jacob Dixon, a community organizer who was born and raised in Roosevelt.
“It’s not to say there’s not the best intentions,” Dixon says. “I think it’s more so: Who is leading the work and who is on the ground to identify there needs to be a larger response? (They) shouldn’t have to come to you to tell you what the problem is, if your job is to come to the people.”
Dixon’s nonprofit organization, Choice for All, was instrumental in having several polluted properties cleaned up in Roosevelt, and worked with the county health department to conduct air and water testing in nearby homes. Now, he is focused on increasing the availability of healthy, affordable food in the area and on improving Roosevelt’s high school graduation rate, which sits at 64 percent.
He also employs two community health workers who were trained through Northwell’s program.
“We have all these different pieces in place, but the concern is sustainability of funding,” Dixon says. Like many community-based groups, many of Choice for All’s initiatives are grant-funded, so when the money dries up, programs can, too.
In the past, Dixon and others have not been able to rely on funding from Nassau County, which is cash-strapped and under the authority of a state financial oversight board despite having one of the highest property tax rates in the state. A report from the county’s comptroller shows Nassau County had more than $3 billion in outstanding long-term debt in 2017, and indicates its financial position was weakened during former County Executive Edward Mangano’s tenure, which ran from 2010 to 2017. (Mangano and his wife recently were convicted on corruption charges.)
County Executive Laura Curran, who took office in 2018, has worked to revamp the county’s property tax system – which a Newsday investigation last year found had disproportionately burdened many property owners under Mangano – and highlighted her plan to regain public trust and ensure financial responsibility during her State of the County address earlier this month.
“We are now on the road to fairness, equity and accuracy,” Curran said during the speech.
Ensuring Nassau County is truly an equitable place to live will require a more targeted focus on health, advocates say. The county is growing more diverse by the year, with census estimates showing an influx of roughly 25,000 Asian and Hispanic immigrants since 2010. Advocates say the county must be willing to change with the population in order to improve health for the people of Nassau County – all of Nassau County.
“Without the ability to dictate from the top, like you can in a city, often these problems are solved one village at a time,” Hofstra’s Levy says. “That’s very inefficient, and not very effective … To break that cycle of dysfunction is very difficult, and it is really the challenge of our time in suburban America.”
by North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center | Mar 26, 2019 | Blog
Does your child beg you for the latest version of the iPhone, or the hottest videogame, or even an outrageously priced handbag from the latest designer?
“Our kids are growing up in a world where what you have is sometimes seen as more important than who you are,” says Andrew Malekoff, Executive Director of North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center. “It’s the job of parents and other role models to teach children what truly matters: things like their ability to be kind, respectful, grateful and adventurous.”
What are parents up against in their quest to make their kids have a deep sense of self-worth because of who they are and how they treat people rather than because of what they own? The onslaught of advertising is quite a formidable opponent in trying to battle consumerism. According to The Nielsen Company, kids ages 2-5 spend more than 32 hours a week in front of the TV screen, while 6-11 year olds spend about 28 hours a week. And those statistics don’t factor in time spent on computers or smart phones or other media platforms.
“Child advertising may impact self-esteem, making kids feel inferior to their peers if they do not have the latest products seen in commercials,” says Malekoff.
But there is some good news for those who are disgusted by the overload and the manipulative nature of the ads that try to turn our kids into voracious consumers. According to the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (CCFC), Senators Ed Markey and Josh Hawley have recently proposed the strongest restrictions on marketing to children in more than two decades. Their bill, which we was designed with the CCFC’s help, would:
- Ban all targeted marketing to children under 13. That means advertisers can’t use kids’ locations, interests, browsing habits or anything else about them to target them with ads.
- Hold companies like YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat accountable for profiting off of the millions of underage children that regularly use their sites.
- Give teens important new privacy protections.
- Create a kid-focused division at the Federal Trade Commission to enforce these new rules.
In addition to voicing your support for this bill, you can follow some of CCFC’s suggestions on how to reclaim childhood from corporate marketers:
- Carve out commercial-free time. Make creative and outdoor play the norm. Have family nights for games, projects and other fun.
- Limit screen time. Pediatricians recommend: A. NO screen time for kids under two; B. Time limits for older kids; C. Keep bedrooms screen free.
- Reclaim your school. Work with friends and educators to limit (or eliminate) advertising in your community’s schools.
- Call out the worst corporate offenders on social networks and blogs. Share commercial-free alternatives.
- Learn more. Hold discussion groups, film viewings and book groups at your school, library or place of worship.
- Choose commercial-free. Buy toys, food and clothing from companies that do not market directly to children. Avoid companies that do.
As Malekoff says, “When you’re deciding how to spend your money, think about giving your children richness of experiences instead of a wealth of stuff. Most of all, give them your time and attention. They will value that more than anything they can buy in a store.”
Sources:
https://commercialfreechildhood.org/blog/its-happening-new-bill-will-ban-targeted-marketing-kids-online
https://commercialfreechildhood.org/resource/ten-things-you-can-do-reclaim-childhood-corporate-marketers
https://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2009/tv-viewing-among-kids-at-an-eight-year-high.html
by North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center | Mar 22, 2019 | Blog
At North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center, our staff includes some amazing social workers who give their all to help children and teens who are suffering from a host of mental health challenges. Their goal is to move them from hurting to healing.
That mission is a heartfelt one for Elissa Smilowitz, a senior staff member who started at the Guidance Center in 2001. Her first role was as a psychiatric social worker at our middle school Intensive Support Program (ISP), one of the three Nassau B.O.C.E.S. schools where we provide extensive mental health services to students having difficulties succeeding in a typical school environment.
“In the ISP, the children and teens have a significant history of psychiatric and behavioral difficulties,” says Smilowitz. “A lot of the work involves educating parents regarding the needs of their children and validating the struggles they have trying to work with their home school districts to get the accommodations their kids require.”
Smilowitz flourished in that role, and in her sixth year was asked to become the coordinator of the Guidance Center’s high school ISP at Nassau B.O.C.E.S. in Wantagh. “All three of the Guidance Center’s ISP programs take a wrap-around approach, working with the family, the school, psychiatrists and case management services to help these children and teens succeed,” she says. “It really does take a village.”
She adds, “We strongly encourage the parents that the goal of ISP is to have their children become independent. Parents and kids feel very supported by this program, and that’s very rare.”
For all kids, no matter their age, she adds, the most important thing is to focus on making them feel accepted and loved for who they are. “So many of them have been labeled as ‘problems’ for so long that they view themselves through that negative lens,” she says. “In ISP, we work with them, along with their families, so they stop identifying themselves by their challenges and instead feel proud of their strengths. They learn the academic and emotional skills needed to go to college or thrive on whatever path they choose.”
After a total of 11 years with the ISP, Smilowitz began working at our main headquarters as the Coordinator of Triage and Emergency Services. In this critical role, she heads up a team that responds rapidly to help children who are in need of immediate, intensive outpatient care due to their at-risk behaviors.
“Many of the adolescents in this program are in danger of suicide and self-harm, and they have a significant decline in their everyday functioning,” she says. “The goals of the program are to encourage them to learn healthy coping skills, stabilize their mood and decrease the need for emergency room visits or in-patient hospitalizations. It’s a team approach of outpatient services that you don’t get anywhere else.”
A Mother’s Passion
Smilowitz didn’t start her career planning to be a social worker. For 30 years, she worked with her husband in the hardware business that they owned. But even during that time, as a young mother the seeds of her future career took hold.
“When my kids were younger, they had learning disabilities,” Smilowitz says. “Even though my son aced his tests, homework was difficult for him.”
Her son was found to have a motor skills disability, which impacted his academic ability—and his self-esteem. “Back then everything was writing, not typing on a keyboard,” she says. “Once his issues were clear, he got accommodations that helped him move from failing to getting ‘A’s in school.”
The problem was rooted in genetic issues, she explains, and her other son and daughter had similar issues. She learned how to advocate for their needs—and she took that knowledge and began volunteering to attend special education meetings with other parents who were new to the process.
“I wanted all kids to get the help they needed to feel better about themselves,” she says. “Parents don’t always know what kind of services their children are entitled to, and I felt it was my calling to help other parents understand the system.”
Once her son went to college, Smilowitz decided to go back to school to get her Masters in social work—and that decision has not only given her a career that she loves, but given many children and families the kind of support that can change lives.
The mission of the Guidance Center is one that Smilowitz embraces. “Working in such a holistic way is very aligned with my beliefs and my desire to help children and families improve their lives and destinies. I’m so proud of the work of the Guidance Center.”
