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Reminders

  1. SIGN & SUBMIT ALL ADOBE FORMS SENT VIA EMAIL
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  3. REMEMBER TO UPDATE OPTIMA
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  5. SUPERVISORS WILL BE REACHING OUT TO UPDATE ANY CLEARANCES THAT NEED RENEWED
  6. SEE YOUR KIDDO, FACE TO FACE, 1X A MONTH OR FILL OUT A MISSED VISIT FORM
  7. ALL MISSED VISIT FORMS SHOULD BE SENT TO YOUR SUPERVISOR

Advocate Resources

Updates

Engagement Bags!
We still have engagement bags available for all age groups, even teens!

Events

CASA to CASA

These calls take place every 3rd Thursday of the month – look for an email from our Program Director, Melissa Burns for information on how to join the call each month.

Training(s)

New Opportunities

2023 Newsletters

2024 Newsletters

Supervisor Suggestions

Reminder: If you complete an independent study – please reach out to your Advocate Supervisor for the Independent Study Form OR download/fill out the form below and send it to your supervisor  to receive credit.

PodCasts, Webinars & Other

  • TBRI (Trust-Based Relationship Intervention)
    TBRI® 101: A Self-Guided Course in Trust-Based Relationships is a series of self-paced, whiteboard-style video lessons. This course offers an informal, yet thorough approach to Trust-Based Relational Intervention®, an evidence-based intervention for children from hard places of abuse, neglect, and/or trauma. Over nearly eight hours of instruction, Dr. Karyn Purvis and Dr. David Cross guide the viewer through the principles and strategies of TBRI® and offer practical tips for implementation.

    • Just create an account and you will have access to the TBRI training and many other great trainings! Don’t forget to fill out a CON-ED FORM to get credit!

Movies

  • The Ride
  • Secondhand Lions
  • Instant Family
  • Good Will Hunting
  • Hotel for Dogs
  • Blue Miracle
  • Secondhand Lions
  • I am Sam
  • Lilo & Stitchl.

  • A Girl Like Her
  • Mr. Holland’s Opus
  • Rewind (2019)
  • The Sound of Freedom
  • The Book Thief 

Books

  • To the End of June
  • Boundaries by Dr. Henry St. Cloud & Dr. John Townsend
  • My Grandmothers Hands by Resmaa Menakem
  • The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida 
  • A Child Called It by Dave Peter
  • Homecoming by Cynthia Voight
  • Hope & Heartbreak: Beyond the Numbers of the Opioid Epidemic
  • Gone Baby Gone by Dennis Lehane
  • Be An Inspiration; 101 things YOU CAN DO to Prevent Child Abuse by Debbie Janae
  • Nurturing Adoptions: Creating Resilience after Neglect & Trauma
  • Together Unbroken: Stories, Law, Practice and Healing at the Intersection of Domestic Violence and Child Welfare. by Sara Block
  • Far from the Tree by Robin Benway
  • The Darkest Child by Delores Philips
  • Recycled Child by J.C Pater

Television

  • Our America with Lisa Ling
  • This is Us

CASA Trainings

Trauma Series
with Dr. Mucha
ACES with Dr. Jacobs

Fostering Futures

Fostering Futures I introduces the science and psychology of working with and understanding teens who have been traumatized.  It provides tools including“Possible Selves” that provides questions for the CASA Advocate-Mentor and their youth to explore dreams for an exciting future, and the steps that it would take to accomplish that future.

*This recording is meant for review purposes only and not in exchange for the Fostering Futures training.

Fostering Futures II: Transitioning To Adulthood

Fostering Futures Level II the emphasis is switched to provide extraordinary resources for the Advocate-Mentor and the youth to research options for the youth’s future….and make solid action plans – together – to help the youth stay on task and launch well!

National CASA Materials

The Pennsylvania Dependency Benchbook

Dependency: The Pennsylvania Dependency Benchbook, 3rd edition is a comprehensive reference guide designed to assist family court judges and child dependency practitioners in the process of helping abused and neglected children and their families. The Benchbook was written by Pennsylvania judges for Pennsylvania judges.

Reading

Childhood Trauma

  • The Whole Brain Child
    by Daniel Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson
  • How to Talk so Kids will Listen and How to Listen so Kids will Talk
    by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish
  • Families Change: A Book for Children Experiencing Termination of Parental Rights
    by Julie Nelson
  • Porcupette Finds a Family
    by Vanita Oelschlager 
  • Maybe Days
    by Jennifer Wilgocki and Marcia Kahn Wright
  • Murphy’s Three Homes
    by Jan Levinson Gilman 
  • Healing Days:  A Guide for Kids who have Experienced Trauma
    by Susan Farber Straus

Movies

Childhood Trauma Videos

Movies: Documentaires

(Poverty, homelessness, child welfare, immigration)
At 15, Inocente refuses to let her dream of becoming an artist be caged by her life as an undocumented immigrant forced to live homeless for the last nine years.

(Foster care, stories written and performed by foster youth)
Know How captures the reality of life in foster care from the point of view of those living in it. It’s not a documentary nor is it fiction. It’s a hybrid approach for using film to create social change. Instead of professional screenwriters and actors, these true stories are written and performed by a cast of ordinary foster care youth, and their performances are powerful, moving, and eye-opening.

(Interracial adoption, abuse, Native children, sibling group, family secrets, domestic violence, substance abuse)
On June 27, 1978, a 44-car freight train struck and killed two Crow Indian brothers near the quaint town of Little Falls, NY. The day before, Bobby, 13, and Tyler, 11, had disappeared. They had run away from the white, Baptist family that seven years earlier had adopted them out of a troubled home on the Crow reservation in Montana. In the documentary Lost Sparrow, filmmaker Chris Billing has embarked on a quest to find out what happened to his adoptive brothers, and to confront a painful family history.

(Interracial adoption, blended families, race, identity, teenagers)
Off and Running tells the story of Brooklyn teenager Avery, a track star with a bright future. She is the adopted African-American child of white Jewish lesbians. Her older brother is black and Puerto Rican and her younger brother is Korean. Though it may not look typical, Avery’s household is like most American homes — until Avery writes to her birth mother and the response throws her into crisis.

(Sexual abuse, human trafficking)
The film takes us into the work of a former sexually exploited youth-turned-activist named Rachel Lloyd, who started the New York City organization GEMS (Girls Educational and Mentoring Services) to help victimized young women escape their pimps and find another way of life.

Movies: Drama

  • Antwone Fisher
    (Based on a real person, foster care, abuse, sexual abuse)
    Antwone Fisher, a young navy man, is forced to see a psychiatrist after a violent outburst against a fellow crewman. During the course of treatment a painful past is revealed and a new hope begins.
  • A Beautiful Mind
    (Mental illness)
    After a brilliant but asocial mathematician accepts secret work in cryptography, his life takes a turn for the nightmarish.
  • The Blind Side
    (Foster care, drug abuse, success story, based on real person)
    The story of Michael Oher, a homeless and traumatized boy who became an All American football player and first round NFL draft pick with the help of a caring woman and her family.
  • Camp
    (Foster care, abuse)
    To impress a potential client, financial advisor Ken Matthews signs up to be a counselor at a camp for kids in the foster system.
  • Crash
    (Race and class issues)
    Los Angeles citizens with vastly separate lives collide in interweaving stories of race, loss and redemption.
  • Dolores Clairborne
    (Physical abuse, sexual abuse, mother-daughter relationship)
    A big-city reporter travels to the small town where her mother has been arrested for the murder of an elderly woman that she works for as a maid.
  • Freedom Writers
    (Education, race, ‘at-risk’ teens, based on real person)
    A young teacher inspires her class of at-risk students to learn tolerance, apply themselves, and pursue education beyond high school.
  • Gimme Shelter (2013)
    (Based on true story, teen pregnancy, foster care)
    A pregnant teenager flees her abusive mother in search of her father, only to be rejected by her dad and forced to survive on the streets until a compassionate stranger offers a hopeful alternative.
  • Gracie’s Choice
    (Teen taking care of siblings, drugs, incarceration)
    A teenage girl tries to raise her three half-brothers and 1 half-sister on her own after their drug-addicted mother is sent to jail
  • I Am Sam
    (Parenting, mental disability, custody battle)
    A mentally retarded man fights for custody of his 7-year-old daughter, and in the process teaches his cold-hearted lawyer the value of love and family.
  • Precious
    (Poverty, abuse, sexual abuse, teen parent, custody issues, education)
    In New York City’s Harlem circa 1987, an overweight, abused, illiterate teen who is pregnant with her second child is invited to enroll in an alternative school in hopes that her life can head in a new direction.
  • The Pursuit of Happyness
    (Poverty, homelessness, parenting, based on real person)
    A struggling salesman takes custody of his son as he’s poised to begin a life-changing professional endeavor.
  • Short Term 12
    (Foster care, group home life)
    A 20-something supervising staff member of a residential treatment facility navigates the troubled waters of that world alongside her co-worker and longtime boyfriend.
  • White Oleander
    (Neglect, foster care, group home, substance abuse)
    A teenager journeys through

Movies: For Children

  • Anne of Green Gables
    (Adoption)
    An orphan girl, sent to an elderly brother and sister by mistake, charms her new home and community with her firey spirit and imagination.
  • Annie
    (Adoption)
    Broadway musical based on the Little Orphan Annie comic strip. A young orphan girl’s adventures in finding a family that will take her.
  • Despicable Me
    (Adoption)
    When a criminal mastermind uses a trio of orphan girls as pawns for a grand scheme, he finds their love is profoundly changing him for the better.
  • Hotel for Dogs
    (Foster care, poor foster parenting, siblings, adoption)
    Animals are strictly forbidden at Andi and her little brother Bruce’s foster home. But for Friday, the adorable dog they secretly care for, they’re ready to risk everything.
  • Kung-Fu Panda Series
    (Adoption, cross-species parenting)
    In the Valley of Peace, Po the Panda finds himself chosen as the Dragon Warrior despite the fact that he is obese and a complete novice at martial arts.

Television

Series

  • The Fosters
    (Foster care, adoption, interracial adoption, LGBT families)
    A multi-ethnic family mix of foster, adopted, and biological kids are being raised by two moms.
  • Our America with Lisa Ling
    Documentary series on marginal groups, including nontraditional families of many types. In 2014, aired a special on foster care.

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