Mental Health Project Proposal: Background
Young people who ‘age out’ of foster care are often forced to leave the same place they had known as home and step into an uncertain environment. The security that often comes with the foster care is no longer available since such young people are expected to live autonomously. Without proper help (e.g. through income earning opportunities), the young people face significant barriers in the social and environmental transition, something that makes them vulnerable to multiple healthcare concerns (English, Stinnett and Dunn-Georgiou 1).
Many such young adults find themselves “with little, if any, financial, medical, or social support”, and as a result, many are prone to criminality, mental illnesses, and inability to function independently and productively in society (Bruskas 71).
Generally, young people who have aged out of foster care register “compromised health; mental disorders; substance abuse; sexual risk behaviors; pregnancy; physical and sexual abuse; and malnourishment” (English et al. 2).
Most of the identified health issues jeopardize the young people’s ability to integrate well with the rest of the society, and in most cases, it also affects their sense of worthiness. The aforementioned factors lead to poor mental health, which is made evident by the high rates of depression, and other mental disorders among young adults who have aged out of foster care.
Notably, some of the issues that pose increasing challenges to the subject young people include the lack of income earning opportunities especially because their education levels are insufficient to get well paying blue collar jobs; those who would wish to pursue further education lack the financial support to do so; those who have income lack the knowledge to manage their finances well.
Having lived in foster care for the better part of their childhood, most young adults lack housekeeping skills, while those on medication usually fail to manage their daily doses of medication as ordered by the doctor. To improve their situations in the above identified areas, this project seeks to recruit qualified professionals who can counsel and guide the young people, hence helping them become better equipped at handling the social and mental challenges that come their way.
The project is inspired by the revelation that young people who have mental challenges or illnesses find it difficult to find “services that aid in the transition into adulthood” (Government Accountability Office 2).
Finding affordable and age-appropriate housing, getting decent and fairly well paying jobs and becoming socially included in their host communities are specific areas that pose challenges to young people who have aged out of foster care (Government Accountability Office 2; Pecora 5). Such challenges contribute further to the worsening of their mental health since the stress of day-to-day living can at times overwhelm them physically and/or emotionally.
Project Proposal on Mental Health Awareness: Scope
For the above-proposed project to become feasible, the following essential consideration areas will require the team’s attention.
- Finding professional guidance and counseling personnel. Specifically, the program will need:
- A life coach, who can offer supportive guidance and counseling services to the target young people and where need be, meet them at their individual residential settings;
- A master therapist with adequate knowledge regarding mental and social health.
- Deciding the kind of supportive services best suited to help the target group. Specifically, supportive service for people suffering from mental illnesses and social challenges will be vital for the program to have a lasting effect. Some of the services that may be needed in this area include:
- Affordable and safe transitional houses;
- College education vacancies for those who would like to pursue further studies;
- Employment for those who are willing to start earning income;
- Mental and overall health services;
- Substance abuse (rehabilitation) services for those willing to quit their drug use habits. It will also be important for the project to equip the targeted group with independent living skills such as financial management, cooking, and cleaning skills.
- Identifying and adopting a strategy that will help the target group transition from foster care into young responsible adulthood. Some of the considerations in these areas include availing social opportunities to the young people, and educating and informing members of the society about their role in supporting the target group integrate in the community successfully.
Mental Health Proposal: Methods
This project will use a strength-based model, and as such, will focus on how the guidance and counseling practitioners can assist the target young people to collaborate with their peers, families, and the community with the aim of overcoming some of the challenges encountered during the transition from foster homes into the larger communities.
According to (Rangan 127), a strength-based model “involves systematically examining survival skills, abilities, knowledge, resources and desires that can be used in some way to help meet the client goals”. Following this description, this project will seek to:
- Build on the young people’s potential and help them attain a sense of self worthiness;
- Encourage them to attain set personal goals;
- Encourage them to attain highest possible independence levels;
- Encourage them to integrate well in communities.
The project will also focus on identifying the untapped gifts, the positive attributes, and any underdeveloped capabilities in the targeted young people. By helping reveal such gifts, attributes and capabilities, the project is convinced that most such people will have a different (but positive) perspective of who they are.
Additionally, the program developer is convinced that such changes in self-perception will boost the confidence of individual people in the targeted group. Consequently, the program will have aided the young people overcome some of the factors contributing to poor mental health.
Mental Health Project Proposal: Project Management
In addition to identifying and orienting the guidance and counseling professionals (two life coaches and a master therapist) who will be involved in this project, the following activities will take place. They include:
- Identifying 30 young people who have outgrown foster care and who have subsequently started the process of integrating into the society. Participation will be voluntary, and program results and findings will not be published in a manner that exposes participants to ridicule or make them the subject to stereotypes.
- Assess all the 30 participants and identify their capabilities, talents, and the main mental and/or social challenges that they encounter as they strive to integrate into the larger society.
- Identify goals that each project participant has, and develop a flexible plan for achieving the same. This activity will include recognizing challenges faced by individual participant and devising methods to overcome the same.
- Team members, and the professionals hired for this project will encourage the project participants to be part of informal peer networks, or any existing formal networks in their host or local communities. Such encouragement will aim at enhancing the participants’ ability to overcome social challenges.
Work Distribution Plan
The four-team members will take on the following roles:
Majed Ismael (Psychologist Project Manager)
Caxton Junior (Team Member)
Jared Senior (Team Member)
Kim Young (Team Member)
Project Schedule
For a program running for a year, constant meetings may be too demanding for the team members and the professionals involved. However, seeing that the project will be localized in Brevard County, team members will seek clarification from the project manager whenever they deem it necessary. Physical meetings will also be scheduled whenever the need to do so arises.
With the availability of information technology platforms however, discussing issues affecting the project will be done through such platforms. The main physical meetings as indicated above will include the four activities documented above, which include assessment, planning, interim evaluation, and final evaluation. Some of the aforementioned activities may require more than one physical meeting, which will be scheduled based on the necessity of the same.
Project Proposal on Mental Health Awareness: Conclusion
As indicated in the introductory part of this proposal, young people who age-out of foster care are exposed to challenges that may affect their overall wellbeing, and most especially their mental health. This proposal is, thus, intended to equip such young people with coping skills that will not only enable them integrate well into society, but will also enhance their mental wellbeing.
The project management section above indicates the major activities of the project, and if the program schedule proceeds as conceptualized, it would be expected that most of the foster care alumni involved in the project will be mentally healthier, and full of social skills to face the larger society once the project ends.
Works Cited
Bruskas, Delilah. “Children in Foster Care: a Vulnerable Population at Risk.”Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Nursing 21.2 (2008): 70-77. Print.
English, Abigail, Amy Stinnett and Elisha Dunn-Georgiou. “Healthcare for Adolescents and Young Adults Leaving Foster Care: Policy Options for Improving Access.” Issue Brief- Center for Adolescent Health & the Law, Feb. (2006): 1-8. Print.
Government Accountability Office. 2008. Young Adults with Serious Mental Illnesses. PDF file. Web.
Pecora, Peter, Peter Jensen, Lisa Hunter Romanelli, Lovie Jackson and Abel Ortiz. “Mental Health Services for Children Placed in Foster Care: An Overview of Current Challenges.” Child Welfare 88.1(2009): 5-26. Print.
Rangan, Aarti Sekar. 2006. Strengths perspectives in Mental Health (Evidence Based Case Study).PDF file. Web.