SARAH Tuxis Innovative Supports Seniors Project Update Spring 2001
The agency supports a wide variety of persons. Among them are 12 seniors, who have become part of an interagency planning effort. Five of these persons are ladies who lived together for several years and some have voiced specific requests to live in alternative settings. Their average age is approximately 69. Six other persons lived in a different home, most of them are former residents of Mansfield Training School. Their average age is 79. The last person currently lives in a supported living setting with a housemate who does not have a disability. For some of the group the need to find a more responsive setting is more urgent than others. Medical concerns in a few cases require immediate attention.
Working with our South Central Region of the Department of Mental Retardation and a statewide pilot program designed to test the implementation of a "Brokers" role into the service system, SARAH Tuxis evaluated better ways to support its seniors population. A "given" in the study has been the potential for "unbundling of the DMR group home resources". We anticipated this concept would be more possible in one setting where the residence is leased. In the end this was not the case as the four persons who chose to remain housemates preferred to keep the home. A real obstacle in the second home was the reality that it is a HUD property. A planning committee was developed in the winter of 1996/97. Initially the group was composed of agency staff who have daily responsibilities with our seniors and our DMR Broker. In subsequent months we added a Program Director of a local Agency on Aging, and two representatives of two different town social services departments who specialize is services to the aging and another Executive Director of a nearby agency who has formerly chaired an MR/Aging coalition and periodically family members of the seniors.
Given the Person Centered commitment of the agency, we began our study with comprehensive PATH plans on all 12 people. Simultaneous to the PATH plan development, the committee began to identify and explore potential risks and rewards of various alternative support options. We examined the similarities and contrasts of various individual plans and the possible ways existing, and new resources could be used to create responsive individualized support options. At this time two gentlemen have moved out of their group home. One lives with two other men. One has a disability one does not. The other lives alone in an apartment. He has moved several times but now seems to be living in a setting that supports him well. Although two women from our HUD home were interested in moving out one has decided to postpone the decision and the other briefly lived in her ideal setting before a serious illness forced her to return to her group home. Three women and one man have chosen to stay living as housemates. One of these women who recently celebrated her 75 th birthday works two days a week as a foster grandparent in a local day care center. She has hired her own support staff to assist her and pays that person on a biweekly basis.
As most everyone who wanted to find an alternative setting has achieved his/her goal the study group is now concentrating on evaluating what the agency does best to support seniors. Sensitivities to extremely individualized needs is one of those "bests" as is honoring personal choices. Maintaining a stable support staff with sound medical knowledge of aging issues is a skill area that is constantly being addressed. Partnering with a wide variety of other community resources is assisting in this process. As the seniors in our original study group continue to age and others supported by the agency become cohorts, we strive to strike a balance between ensuring responsive medical supports and providing the atmosphere of choice that keeps people young and achieving their individual dreams.
We invite anyone who is reading this and has developed support options for seniors to share their ideas with us at Tuxis@cshore.com.
Unified Arts
It was a sound never heard before in the small shoreline town of Guilford: the thunder of more than 200 drums beating in rhythm, echoing through the town's Community Center on a cold January afternoon. The participants of this unique event were young and old, accomplished drummers and curious novices. They were persons with and without disabilities. They were representative of the fabric of the shoreline communities in which they lived. The event was the first major Unified Arts program sponsored by SARAH Tuxis, the Guilford Parks and Recreation Department and the Shoreline Alliance for the Arts. That was 1997!
Inspired by the enormous success of the Special Olympics Unified Sports program the SARAH Tuxis staff sought new opportunities for people with disabilities who have an interest in the arts. The initiative started small. A few persons supported by the agency were included in regular art classes conducted by a local art studio, The Art Cellar in Clinton, Ct. Over time the classes became more varied, including sculpting, water colors and the making of masks.
The new approach to arts was first introduced to the community early in January 1997 via a local radio program carried on WMNR.. "The Community Forum" was hosted by Ann Christensen. A spirited group of five Tuxis artists enjoyed participating in this radio debut. The opportunities for inclusion grew as SARAH Tuxis joined with the Friends of the Westbrook Library and the Westbrook Parks and Recreation Department in sponsoring a "Warm Up Winter Arts Series". The first event was a concert entitled "Jazz Perspectives: from Mozart to Monk," featuring the Farewell Brown Quartet. Subsequently the citizens of Westbrook have enjoyed many series of concerts.
By striking new partnerships with shoreline towns, civic organizations and artisans, the agency has sought to create individual opportunities for the people it supports to be included in their communities in a way that has never been attempted before.
The fall of 1997 witnessed an expansion of our Unified Arts program with the initiation of our Looking Out Looking In project. Working off of an idea from a SARAH Tuxis Board member, we solicited the participation of ten area photographers to become mentors to twelve persons supported by SARAH Tuxis . The assistance of Harold Shapiro and the Photographic Arts Collective was invaluable in this project. The results have been extraordinary! "The story" of this project are found both in the photographs that have been taken and in the relationships that have been developed between student and mentor. The mentors taught their students how to use both a Holga and an instamatic camera. The results were displayed at an opening show at the Guilford Library in March of 1998, simultaneous with the opening of the well established "Images" photography show at the Guilford Handcraft Center. Shortly after this opening the participants photographs were featured in the opening of the city of New Haven's Festival of Arts and Ideas. Following this display were a series of shows at area libraries from towns that spanned the Connecticut shoreline. Shows from Guilford to Waterford have attracted visitors for over three years.
Also in the fall of 1997, we were invited back to WMNR, "Community Forum". The host, Ann Christensen, invited some of the student photographers and their mentors to talk about their experiences with the project. We also used the occasion to introduce the public to our participation in the "Faculty and Student Art Show'" at the Art Cellar in Clinton. Here, artists with and without disabilities, displayed their work together. This is the first of what we hope will be an annual inclusive art show that displays art works without labels. Representing her own commitment to the inclusion concept we try to foster, the owner of the Art Cellar requested no public distinction be made about the participants in the program. The many visitors who surveyed the works were unaware that persons with disabilities were student participants.
A final viewing of the show was held at the Hull Henry Carter Library in Clinton in February 2000. The generous sponsorship of the Clinton Rotary Club made this and the simultaneous Student and Faculty Art Show possible.
Revised Spring 2003