"The program supports deployed troops and military families in California by connecting military personnel who are abroad with their families back home; providing grief and psychological counseling; and recruiting volunteers to further the causes of WE Support."
The Program
The Minerva Military Families Program supports our troops and their families through a variety of initiatives and partnerships by:
- Enabling communication between enlisted members who are overseas and their families back at home.
- Providing access to psychological and emotional counseling.
- Inspiring and empowering young military members, wives and daughters through The Women's Conference.
- Offering resources to enable members of the public to get involved and show their respect.
Program Partners: Operation Gratitude
Distributing Prepaid Phone Cards
Keeping the lines of communication open between families and their deployed loved ones is critical to maintain the morale of the active duty military and their family. The Women's Conference along with our partner Operation Gratitude, a 501 (c) (3) nonprofit, and others, distributes free phone cards to military personnel and their families giving them time to be able to hear the laughter, first words, expressions of love and gratitude from their families and loved ones at home.
Program Partners: Bob Woodruff Family Foundation
Supporting Grief and Psychological Counseling
Through our partnership with the Bob Woodruff Family Foundation (BWFF), The Women's Conference plays an important role in ensuring successful futures for our injured service members, veterans and their families who have volunteered to bravely serve our great nation. A collaborative effort with the BWFF enables The Women's Conference to reach out to grassroots charitable organizations in California in order to improve the lives of these heroes and their families within their local communities. Through this improtant partnership, we will help ensure that our courageous troops and their families receive the best treatment, education, and support as they reintegrate back to civillian life or further duty.
Program Partners: First Lady's Military Families Initiative
Providing Information and Volunteer Resources
First Lady Maria Shriver established a Military Families Initiative to help support California families through volunteer efforts from their fellow Californians. The First Lady believes that every Californian can serve this State and has challenged organizations, businesses, community groups, schools and faith-based groups to step forward and volunteer their time on behalf of military families in their time of need.
Comments
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I am a volunteer and founder of the National Guard and Reserves Family and Youth Foundation. Our primary mission is to assist members of our reserve component (deployed or otherwise), their dependants and these Veterans in meeting basic living needs through financial grants and referrals. I am a member of NAMI OC's Veterans Committtee as well as the Long Beach Veteran's Administration's Consumer Council.
In 2007, I had the honor to consult on the California Institute for Mental Health's "Another Kind of Valor" project, this project was also approved by the US Army Surgeon General's Office. The mission presented in this learning tool attempts to bring forth public awareness of the duanting challenges faced by mental health professionals, military families, our communities and our returning IOF and OEF Veterans who turn to them for assistance. The 9 vinettes found on the 3 DVDS will take you through some of these challenges as well as the therapies available for treatment.
Our organization is seeing a dramatic increase in the number of reserve component members with families who upon returning from their participation in OIF or OEF are in severe financial crisis, often homeless and seeking assistance.
This special and rightfully proud group of heros are further traumatised when they return home... many are returning to find they no longer have a job due to the state of our Nation's economy. Prospective employers fearful of hiring a Reservist due to potential National deployment demands. Without basic living needs being met (food, shelter and medical care) for the citizen-soldier and his/her family, civilian life and family begins to unravel creating a vicious cycle of dispair. The National Guard and Reserves Family and Youth Foundation attempts to intervene, breaking this cycle by providing financial assistance to meet basic living needs until they are once again stabalized and self-sufficient. Our collaborative efforts and strategic alliances helps to assure each citizen-soldier has access to additional service providers and is treated with the dignity and respect they have already earned through their unconditional service to our country.
Posted by Karen Meadows-McGraw, 7 February 2009, (5 months ago)
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I am a volunteer and serve on the Board of NAMI Orange County, CA. (National Alliance on Mental Illness) I am also the Veterans committee chair for a new program NAMI OC has implemented in support of Veterans and their families, called FRONT LINE. Our veterans are returning home with "invisible injuries" and we are facing an alarming surge in the number of Vets returning home who are suffering from depression, PTSD, TBI and worse yet, an unprecedented rise in the number of suicides in this group. NAMI OC's FRONT LINE is an outreach effort not only to Veterans and their families but to those in our community who serve them. Through our Front Line conferences we educate all concerned on the importance of understanding the effects deployment has had on the mental health of returning soldiers. These conferences provide information and resources for both those who are in need of help and for those who can provide the resources and support. NAMI OC and our community collaborative are moving to the FRONT LINE to serve the Veterans whose wounds are not as visible as the physical injuries we often see in many soldiers, but are just as, if not more disabled by them.
A wonderful video has also been produced which I highly recommend, called "Another Kind of Valor", which addresses the needs of returning Veterans. It is a powerful new DVD/CD learning system that takes the viewer through nine compelling docudramas and explores the behavioral manifestations of veterans deep emotional wounds as they battle "their invisible enemy within." By using common tragic scenarios the series serves as a catalyst for discussion and examination of the mind-altering experiences of our veterans the therapies available to address those needs.Posted by Nomi Lonky, 7 February 2009, (5 months ago)
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