CARA House

Total Served: 327 children 492 adults 171 families

• Resource Exchange Program (REP) - assists families with emergency needs, i.e., clothing, food, household items, cribs, strollers, formula, baby food, and school supplies. All goods and in-kind donations come from the community. 
• Individual and Group Parenting Education Classes - a full-time Parent Educator works with families individually as well as facilitates the Nurturing Parent Program.
• Community Parent Advocates and Mentors - are trained to promote effective parenting behaviors. These community volunteers also disseminate appropriate and culturally-relevant parenting and family service information, verbally and through literature, to adults and children.

• Men-In-Motion, Fathers' Program - assists fathers in exploring and clarifying the importance of emotional support and role modeling responsible adult parent behavior, in support of healthy child development.
• The Family Connections Program (FCP), in partnership with the District of Columbia Department of Human Services' Income Maintenance Administration, provides family mentoring and social services to low income families, by connecting them to strong, healthy families in the community who are economically stable and demonstrate positive parenting skills. These families serve as mentors to low-income families in need. Through FCP these families are able to transition from dependency on the welfare system.
• KinNet Program- provides a support group that meets  twice a month to address the diverse needs of  relative caregivers (great grandparents, grandparents, aunts and uncles). Participants include both formal relative caregivers and informal relative caregivers. The goals for the support groups include role modeling group facilitation to the participants and nurturing their natural leadership skills. Throughout the year, group members go on outings and guest speakers join the group to facilitate special topics identified by group members.
  
• Nurturing Parent Program -provides both individual and group parenting education. A full-time Parent Educator works with families individually and facilitates a 9-week parenting education class to reinforce parental strengths, provide information on child development and effective approaches to supporting and disciplining children, create parent peer supports and opportunities, and identify threats and assaults on healthy child development, including critical and specific preventive strategies for sexual, physical, and emotional abuse and neglect.

Other Services: 

Conflict resolution skills
Therapeutic family camp
Employment and computer skills training
Child advocacy
Community referrals
Mentoring and tutoring
Child and family recreational activities
Support groups
Family and individual therapy
Psychological and social assessments
Job readiness services
Youth leadership initiatives
Rites of Passage (Girls/Boys)
Parenting education and support
Re-entry services
Case management
Summer camp

 

For more information, please contact Michelle Wilson, Division Mananger of Community-Based Services at (202) 396-9330, ext. 11 or mdwilson0225@aol.com