This week we had presentations from 3 recent scholarship recipients followed by a presentation from Yudelkis Nivar from The New Jersey Department of Children and Families.
Alyssa Nungra, recipient of the Laganella Scholarship, will be starting her senior year at Rutgers University. She spent her summer interning at Morgan Stanley in their brokerage department. She has been very involved with the Dance Marathon at Rutgers University, where they have been able to raise over $1 million for kids with cancer over the last year. She also was and still is very involved with Relay for Life!
Annika Nungra, recipient of the Ruth Grey Memorial Scholarship, is also a senior at Rutgers University and is majoring in Cell Biology and Neuroscience. She is looking forward to medical school when she is done with her degree and she is currently studying for her MCATs. She also spends her time volunteering with the local EMT.
Shannon O'Brien has been very involved with Relay for Life in high school and with the local food bank in town. She will be starting Seton Hall this fall and she will be part of a 6 year Speech Pathology and Teaching program .
Yudelkis Nivar was introduced by Fred Rohdieck, and she came to talk to us about being a Foster or an Adoptive parent. The New Jersey Department of Children and Families is the state’s first comprehensive agency dedicated to ensuring the safety, well-being and success of children, youth, families and communities. Their vision is to ensure a better today and even a greater tomorrow for every individual we serve.
It was created in July 2006, and they are the first Cabinet-level department devoted exclusively to serving and safeguarding the most vulnerable children and families of our state. Since that time, the agency has evolved to be more inclusive of the voice of the individuals it was established to serve. Currently, DCF is staffed by approximately 6,600 employees and encompasses:
Adolescent Services
Centralized Child Abuse/Neglect Hotline
Child Protection and Permanency (formerly Youth and Family Services)
Children's System of Care (formerly Child Behavioral Health Services)
Child Welfare Training Academy
Family and Community Partnerships (formerly Prevention and Community Partnerships)
Institutional Abuse Investigation Unit
Office of Licensing
Specialized Education Services
Women (transferred from DCA)
The Way Forward
In an effort to manage and integrate the multiple priorities of the divisions and offices that make up DCF, they have embarked on a multi-year strategic planning process. It is their hope that this plan will assure a balanced and planful approach to sustaining and building on the strengths of the agency while also developing solutions to areas that require improvement.
Weekly Announcements!
~ Lloyd Astmann reminded us that the CarePlus Golf outing is scheduled for September 11 and they are still looking for donations, sponsors and players!
~Lloyd also reminded us that the Progressive Dinner is schedule for October 28 and there will be more details to follow soon.
~Val reminds us that everyone is invited to his gathering at his house this Saturday, August 19, at 2PM.