In home services include Counseling, Case management, Parent Aid, Mentoring, and  Therapeutic Mentoring

Basic Elements of the Program

1. Three phases of treatment – Assessment, Treatment, and Discharge
2. Services and supports are individualized to meet the needs of the child and family.
3. Parents are included in every level of the therapeutic process
4. The therapeutic process is solution orientated utilizing the ecological model of structural family therapy.

Mary’s House Residential Group Home located in Portsmouth Va.  Licensed by DMHMRSA in 2002 – A short term residential treatment program for adolescent girls ages 12-17

The Williams Stallings Project is located in Portsmouth Va.  Licensed by DMHMRSA in 2007 – A short term residential treatment program for boys ages 12-17

Transitional group homes based on the ecological model of structural family therapy developed by Salvador Munichin.  Both group homes provide therapeutically based treatment with a focus on teaching anger management, and conflict resolution skills, as well as improving peer and family relationships while promoting age appropriate socialization through the provision of individual, family and group counseling.

The Bridge Program

The Bridge Program offers two forms of therapeutic foster care to help children develop essential social skills and formulate relationships in a community-based setting. 

The Bridge Program Resiliency-Based Therapeutic Foster Care is designed for severely at-risk youth as an alternative to residential treatment where family reunification is not the permanency goal.  Research (Zahn, 2005; Giordano, 2005) has demonstrated that interventions which help children increase protective factors are more successful at reducing delinquent and institutional recidivism. 

The Bridge Program Family Reunification Project offers specialized services to reunify children with their biological family where reunification is the permanency goal.  This program utilizes foster care as a short term treatment option to simultaneously stabilize the child and family and expedite reunification.

Additional Services

Substance Abuse Counseling- Substance abuse treatment services are available to adolescents and adults who present with a history of substance use/abuse and are deemed appropriate for outpatient treatment.  Substance abuse assessments, SASSI, individual family and group therapy, substance abuse educational groups and screening are available. 

The Therapeutic Day Treatment Program is a licensed service offered in the local school systems to youth whose behaviors place them at risk of removal from community-based education programs.  The program offers a combination of behavior management, counseling services and pro-social skill development.  Behavior management is offered 1:1, in small groups and in the classroom to help students learn to behave in a classroom setting.  The no-hands on interventions are also taught to classroom teachers and parents.  Individual and family counseling are offered to the youth and family members to help them address the underlying causes of acting-out and/or aggressive behavior. 

Prosocial Skills Development

Family Systems has designed a curriculum that not only teaches students effective ways of coping and managing their anger, but also teaches other necessary social-emotional skills.  This curriculum can be used with both middle and high school students.  In addition to our anger management curriculum, we also utilize the nationally and internationally recognized Second Step curriculum, a violence prevention curriculum that is based on 20 years of research and designed for children Pre/K-Middle School.  The program focuses on social-emotional development and aggression prevention.  It has been shown to reduce problem behaviors, aggressive behaviors and peer rejection.   The Second Step curriculum is effective with students across socioeconomic and racial backgrounds and geographic settings.  

Primary Interventions for Prosocial Skills Development

Anger Management                                     Rites of Passage

Critical Thinking/Thinking Errors             Peer Mediation & Conflict Resolution

Family Systems is available to provide in-school groups that teach social-emotional skills, the foundation for learning.  The program utilizes music and movement to encourage rapid learning and academic growth.  Areas of focus are empathy, impulse control, problem solving, emotional and anger management.   These areas fall under the umbrella of Social-emotional Skills that are necessary for learning, overall academic achievement, and life success.