Minutes from Sept. 7 meeting (attendees: Michael Dennis, Alicia Streets, Heather Hanline, Heather Cooper, Jennifer Lee-Steckman, Maria Frantz, Laura Robinson, Sabrina Tasker, Robert Stephens, John Corbin, Sotiere Savopoulos, Jennifer Brenneman, Mary Van Sickle, Lindsey Strubin, Fred Polce, Jr., Jennifer Corder, MD, Karl Schwalm
Karl Schwalm gave a brief overview of the July meeting regarding the topic of child abuse/neglect and points that came out of that meeting. We spent about 1/2 hour discussing home-based schooling and the difficulties keeping track of children who are pulled from school because of child protective services referrals. Two participants mentioned that they home-schooled their own children due to bullying, and one other participant mentioned they have a friend who did the same. Lindsey Strubin mentioned that it is often difficult for the school to contact some of the parents who are home-schooling. Maria Frantz offered to be a contact person for the Amish and Mennonites at the northern end of the county, though she cautioned we need to do it carefully since they often wish to be separate and remain that way. She also mentioned an informal facebook group of home schoolers called Mountain Friends that we might be able to work with.
We then talked about approaching faith-based groups and seeing if they would work with us on receiving education regarding this problem. The library has been contacted and will have an inservice for all staff on ACE’s and how they relate to child abuse/neglect.
We also discussed how we might work with the schools on this effort. Bullying seems to be an increasing problem, and Heather Hanline commented that we need to be teaching against abuse/neglect and bullying, but teaching toward empahy. She said that most, if no all, bulliers have experienced ACE’s themselves. There may need to be more education of the students themselves regarding “what do you do, who do you tell and students speaking up for themselves. Fred Polce mentioned that his office is helping to bring Rachael’s Challenge back to the schools this year.
Teen Pregnancy was then discussed. Sotiere emphasized that there is a difference between teen pregnancy rates and teen birth rates and that the two have been confused in our past discussions. We may not look so bad when compared to the state when only birth rates are considered. The problem is that we have too many teen births in any case, so we would still like to address the problem. One of the next steps will be for members of our work group to address the obstetrics committee at the hospital, since he delivering doctors deal directly with these patients and may have some good input to consider. This topic was mentioned at the School Health Council, but there was inadequate time to go into a discussion, so it will be addressed at their next meeting.
The Agenda item relating to childhood obesity was not discussed due to inadequate time. Karl Schwalm will try to make some decisions there by email communications.
Action Items:
1. Karl will contact Becky Aiken, Lindsey Strubin, John Hummel, Alicia Streets and Heather Hanline regarding how we might interact with the schools regarding child neglect/abvuse.
2. Karl will contact Maria Frantz, Laura Robinson and Sotiere Savopoulos regarding a plan to involve the faith-based community.