1992 Child Welfare Fund (CWF) founded by an anonymous donor in collaboration with David Tobis at Hunter College . For the chronology of the Child Welfare Fund go to the Child Welfare Fund page of the FSC website or the website of the Child Welfare Fund. 2001 FAR Fund founded by an anonymous donor in collaboration with David Tobis. 2002 CWF and the Open Society Institute create the Partnership for Family Supports and Justice (PFSJ), which becomes a collaboration between ten foundations and the Administration for Children's Services, designed to create a community network of services to prevent foster care placements in Highbridge, the Bronx (the Bridge Builders program). 2002 The Child Welfare Fund, the FAR Fund, and the Partnership for Family Supports and Justice are joined administratively under the Fund for Social Change. 2002 Voices of Youth, with the help of the Fund for Social Change, sends a delegation to Stockholm, Sweden to present its model for youth advocacy at an international conference on alternatives to residential institutions. 2002 Sista II Sista with Downtown Community Television, Inc. produces You Have the Right to Break the Silence , a video documenting harassment and violence, including police violence, against young women of color. 2002 The Justice for Youth Coalition's, No More Youth Jails Campaign, successfully stops New York City from spending $64 million on building 200 youth jail beds in the Bronx and Brooklyn. 2002 The FAR Fund joins the Funders' Collaborative on Youth Organizing, connecting with a group of national, regional and local foundations, and youth organizing practitioners dedicated to advancing youth organizing as a strategy for youth development and social change. 2003 The FAR Fund helps launch a model program at PS 32 in Brooklyn for children with autism who are high functioning. The FAR Fund enables a parent input and support component to be included. The program is designed by NYU's Institute for Education and Social Policy in collaboration with the New York City Department of Education. 2003 The first FAR Fund Fellow, Michael Carley, launches the Global Regional Asperger's Syndrome Partnership, providing much needed support groups for people with high functioning autism. 2003 After a year of organizing parents, students and community members, Girls for Gender Equity successfully prevents the Department of Education from weakening Title IX of the Education Amendment, which states " No person in the U.S. shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, or denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving federal aid." 2003 Philomena Timmons of CWOP is named to the ACS advisory board. She is the first parent with a child in the system to serve on the board. 2004 The Child Welfare Fund and the FAR Fund convene a forum of advocates and consumers from child welfare and developmental disabilities fields to learn from and support each other. 2004 The FAR Fund and the Fund for Social Change create the Campaign for Real Lives, consisting of advocates, self-advocates, parents, providers and academics to make the reality of the developmental disabilities system catch up to its rhetoric. 2004 Gina Cheron , the second FAR Fund Fellow launches a legal unit within Dwa Fanm, providing legal services to Haitian domestic violence survivors and their families in Brooklyn. 2004 Sista II Sista, El Puente and other Brooklyn-based community organizations, in Bushwick successfully pressure their local police precinct to hire a female officer for their Domestic Violence Task Force. 2004 The Fund for Social Change, in collaboration with the Academy for Educational Development, the Community Resource Exchange, the Empire State Coalition of Youth, the Hunter College Center on AIDS, Drugs and Community Health, the New York AIDS Coalition and the Partnership for After School Education convene a "future search" entitled "Creating an HIV-Free Future for NYC's Youth," bringing various stakeholders together to strategize on solutions. 2004 CWF awards first grant to New Yorkers for Children, the non-profit wing of ACS. The grant is used to hire child welfare parents and youth as advocates to increase access to services for families in 11 communities throughout the city. 2004 The Administration for Children's Services joins the The Partnership for Family Supports and Justice as a member of the donors' collaborative in Highbridge. 2004 Child Welfare Fund and David Tobis are honored by CWOP for their work on behalf of families with children in the child welfare system. 2004 Trude Lash, an eminent activist for the rights and well-being of children, dies. The Fund for Social Changes creates the Trude Lash Fellowship Program in collaboration with family, colleagues and friends of Trude Lash. 2005 At the Child Welfare Watch Forum on redesigning the foster care system, ACS Commissioner John Mattingly says, "The Child Welfare Watch reports, I think, are the most thoughtful, balanced and detailed analysis of a particular set of issues in child welfare, that I have ever seen anywhere." 2005 Developmental Disabilities Watch is founded by the FAR Fund and the Campaign for Real Lives, creating an independent journalistic voice to report on the system and drive changes in policy. The DD Watch is modeled on the Child Welfare Watch . 2005 The Fund for Social Change with the Independence Community Foundation, the Spin Gold Foundation, and the New York City Department of Education, creates a donors' collaborative both to identify the special education needs of preschool children and to provide services to meet those needs. The State Department of Education, the Administration for Children's Services, the Human Resources Administration and the New York City Mayor's Office soon join the collaborative. 2005 The New York City Department of Education agrees to replicate the PS 32 model program for high functioning children on the autistic spectrum. 2005 Diana Mc Court, the third FAR Fund Fellow launches One Person at a Time, to secure sustainable, self-directed housing for individuals with developmental disabilities, including those on the autistic spectrum.. 2005 The FAR Fund provides its fourth Fellowship, to Lawrence James, who launches the Rallying, Educating and Building Effective Leadership (R.E.B.E.L.) program to teach people of color basic organizing, self-determination, and leadership skills. 2006 The Trude Lash Fellowship Program, administered by the Fund for Social Change, awards fellowships to Kallen Tsikasas and Regine Romain 2006 The FAR Fund provides its fifth Fellowship to Jonathan Cooper to create a program to reduce bullying of school children on the autistic spectrum.
2006 Nixmary Brown is killed by her step-father. The number of foster care placements increases by 53% from fewer than 4,800 in 2005 to more than 7,200 in 2006.
2006 Fostering Connection, an agency that provides psychotherapy to children in foster care “for as long as it takes” honors David Tobis as the first recipient of its Silver Nest Award.
2006 David Tobis addresses UNICEF’s senior policy staff at Maastricht University about strategies to create community services as an alternative to residential institutions for children.
2006 UNICEF invites David Tobis to Tajikistan to advise on ways to convert its pilot projects for child protection into a national program.
2007 Fifteen foundations and the Administration for Children’s Services are members of the Bridge Builders collaborative in Highbridge, the Bronx. The evaluation by Chapin Hall reports “…what we are hearing and seeing is a type of synergy, a breakthrough in thinking and action that has changed the way collaborative members work and the way that they think about their work.”
2007 The Administration for Children’s Services selects Bridge Builders to receive public funding as part of the Community Partnership Initiative.
2007 The FAR Fund selects the Fund for Social Change to administer the OMRDD/FAR Fund Collaborative to promote more individualized lives for people on the autistic spectrum. Ten agencies and the FAR Fund are part of the collaboration. The administration of the FAR Fund relocates.
2007 Bridge Builders expands the role of the Store Front with trained parents from the community and social work supervision. Over 1000 families are served in 2007.
2007
The Administration for Children’s Services convenes a forum
for Lessons Learned from its three Community Partnership Initiatives.
Bridge Builders is hailed as the “model to emulate. 2008 The Fund for Social Change creates the Parent Advocates Initiative to promote the hiring of parent advocates by foster care agencies. The collaborative includes the Administration for Children’s Services, the New York State Office of Family and Children’s Services, the Council of Family and Child Caring Agencies, CWOP and six foundations. 2008 Legal Information for Families Today (LIFT) asks the FSC to evaluate its court-based information and referral program. LIFT incorporates the recommendations of the evaluation. 2008 David Tobis travels to Tajikistan as part of a team from the University of Maastricht to conduct a cost-benefit analysis comparing a new system of child protection with the country’s current child welfare system which relies on large residential institutions. 2008 David Tobis, through the FSC, works as an advisor to the
GHR Foundation and travels to Ukraine and Azerbaijan to assess
two NGOs that will receive grants from the foundation as part
of its Children in Families Initiative. 2009 The FSC, in cooperation the Schott Foundation, the Booth Ferris Foundation, and the Ira W. DeCamp Foundation, organizes a forum at NYRAG: “Working with Government: Four Donor Collaboratives. 2009 After 18 years of collaboration, the Child Welfare Fund reconsiders its focus. The FSC no long administers the Child Welfare Fund. 2009 New York City Administration for Children’s Services launches the START Program with assistance from the Fund for Social Change which hires five parent advocates to work out of the Bronx Field Office of ACS.
2009 Maestral International is launched by Philip Goldman and David Tobis in collaboration with a team of leading global experts to promote the development of sustainable family or family-like environments for vulnerable children.
2009 Maestral International, working with the Fund for Social Change, is selected by UNICEF to develop a toolkit to map and assess child welfare systems throughout the world. David Tobis participates in the teams that pilot test the toolkit in Kenya, Bangladesh, Tunisia and Kyrgyzstan.
2009 The Fund for Social Change, on behalf of the Parent Advocate Initiative, suggests a change in New York State Social Service Regulations that would allow foster care agencies to receive credit for Parent Advocate contacts with families. The change is endorsed by ACS, COFCCA, OCFS and the advocacy community. The revised regulation is approved by OCFS and goes into effect in August 2010. 2009 The Fund for Social Change undertakes an initiative led by John Courtney to both increase the placement of children in foster homes in their community of origin and to improve the availability and quality of foster homes in general. The project is undertaken with the support of the 4th Generation Klingenstein Foundation and the Warner Fund, in collaboration with the Administration for Children’s Services.
2009 The Fund for Social Changes initiates a collaboration led by Anita Gundanna, with Columbia University School of Social Work’s Center for Social Policy and Practice in the Workplace, to strengthen foster care agencies’ ability to train and find employment for youth leaving foster care.
2009 The Parent Advocates Initiative provides grants to six foster care agencies to hire parent advocates to work with families with children in foster care. The Parent Advocates are trained by the Child Welfare Organizing Project.
2010 In spite of the continued success of Bridge Builders the financial crisis in New York City causes ACS to reduce its planned financial support to community partnerships, including Bridge Builders, reducing planned support from $300,000 to $150,000, causing financial difficulties for the project. Many other child welfare programs also experience significant cuts.
2010 Bridge Builders diversifies its funding, receiving financial support from the NYS Office of Family and Children’s Services on a kinship care project with Children’s Village.
2010 The first meeting of the Interim Board of Directors of Bridge Builders takes place in February. The Interim Board, elected by the membership, is the governing body of Bridge Builders. The Board consists of members of the community, local service providers, and technical experts, including representatives from the Fund for Social Change. Bridge Builders files for NY State incorporation and federal tax exemption as a not-for-profit organization.
2010 ACS withdraws its awards of foster care, preventive service and other contracts. The proposed contracts are withdrawn because of mistakes ACS made in grading agencies and as a result of a law suit against filed by Little Flower Children’s Services against ACS for its decision to not re-contract with that large child welfare agency. The mistakes and the lawsuit embarrass ACS, demoralize its staff and further weakens its focus on reform.
2010 The Oak Foundation, based in Geneva, Switzerland, asks the Fund for Social Change to develop a strategy paper to create an international donors’ collaborative to reduce the reliance on residential care for children, primarily in Eastern Europe and Africa. In April the Fund for Social Change and Maestral International present the strategy paper to the Board of Directors of the Oak Foundation which allocates $3 million to create a donors’ collaborative that would implement the recommendations in the strategy paper.
2010 The Oak Foundation, the Fund for Social Change and Maestral International meet with other foundations at Foundation Week in Brussels, Belgium, gaining support for the donors’ collaborative.
2010 UNICEF/Ukraine asks Maestral International working with the Fund for Social Change, to conduct a review of its five year Country Program and to present recommendations for its next five year program (2012-2016). The assessment is submitted to UNICEF in August.
2010 UNICEF/Headquarters decides to roll out the Maestral toolkit in the East and Southern Africa Region (ESAR). Maestral, working with the Fund for Social Change will train representatives from seven ESAR countries to use the toolkit.
2010 The Child Welfare Organizing Project, supported by the Parent Advocates Initiative, trains seven Parent Advocates who begin working in foster care agencies. The evaluation by Chapin Hall/University of Chicago concludes “All parties agree there is a clear connection between what the PAs [parent advocates] offer to parents and what parents need to be successful in moving their [child welfare] case forward…The PAs and [agency supervisory] staff found the classroom work to lay an important foundation of knowledge.
2010 The Parent Advocate Initiative supports the Child Welfare Organizing Project to establish the Parent Advocates Network. A group of 30 parents meet, create by-laws and begin to work together to support Parent Advocates, to advocate on their behalf, and to expand the use of Parent Advocates in the child welfare system.
2010 Max Chmura becomes the Acting Commission of the New York State Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities. As one of his first acts, he changes the agency’s name to the Office of People With Developmental Disabilities. He asks to meet with 15 representatives of the OMRDD/FAR Fund Collaboration to learn how to infuse the values and accomplishments of the collaboration into the new OPWDD.
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