Free Seminar on Caretaker Issues for Social Service Professionals Offered

OKLAHOMA CAPITOL --Social service professionals who work with or for kinship and grandfamilies, particularly those working with grandparents who are raising grandchildren, are invited to participate in a free training event Thursday, April 19, in Oklahoma City. 

Sandra Cross, executive director of Grand Central, Inc., Philadelphia, will discuss that city’s first kinship care resource center. The training will discuss strategies for working effectively with these grandparents, appropriately handling difficult situations, creatively establishing localized programming and maximizing the grandparent and grandchildren relationship. Cross is the former director of Kinship Programs for Parents Involved Network of Pennsylvania (PIN), and is founder and past director of the Raising Others’ Children (ROC) program.

Oklahoma ranks second nationally in the number of grandparents caring for grandchildren, according to 2000 U.S. Census data.

The training session will be held at The Greater Mt. Olive Baptist Church, 1020 NE 42, Thursday, April 19 from 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. in conjunction with the Spring Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Conference. The conference will continue at the church through Saturday, April 21.

Although all interested persons are invited, the Spring conference focuses specifically on issues of concern to grandparents who are in minority grandfamilies.

The conference and training are free; however, advanced registration is encouraged. Contact Judith Mowery, Oklahoma Department of Human Services Aging Services Division, 405-521-2281, to register and for more information.
The conference is sponsored by OKDHS Aging Services Division, the Areawide Agency on Aging and the Oklahoma City Federation of Colored Women’s Clubs.

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