Springboard Community Services

Last updated
Springboard Community Services
FormationMay 2, 1942;82 years ago (1942-05-02) [1]
Merger ofFamily Welfare Association, Maryland Society to Protect Children from Cruelty and Immorality and Family Welfare, Henry Watson Children's Aid Society of Baltimore, Shelter for Aged and Infirm Colored Persons of Baltimore City, The Electric Sewing Machine Society of Baltimore City, and Maryland Children's and Family Services [1]
52-0591546 [2]
Legal status 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization
Headquarters Baltimore, Maryland, United States
Region
Anne Arundel County, Baltimore City, Baltimore County, Carroll County, Harford County, and Howard County
ServicesTo provide targeted services to vulnerable families and individuals in all stages of life who are experiencing problems related to social and personal adjustment, thereby enhancing their quality of life. [2]
Lisa H. R. Hayes [3]
F.T. Burden [3]
Subsidiaries FCS MD LLC [2]
Revenue (2014)
$6,821,382 [2]
Expenses (2014)$7,377,343 [2]
Endowment $1,913,034 [2]
Employees (2013)
304 [2]
Volunteers (2013)
438 [2]
Website www.springboardmd.org
Formerly called
Family & Children's Services of Central Maryland

Family and Children's Services of Central Maryland, Inc. doing business as Springboard Community Services (SCS), formerly Family and Children's Services (FCS), [4] is a private, nonsectarian social services agency that was founded in 1849. SCS addresses issues from birth through the end of life with a goal to build self-confidence, resilience and hope. SCS is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.

Contents

Services

SCS offers counseling, case management, training, and recruitment of foster families and community volunteers for vulnerable populations, including:

Some services are offered without charge; others are offered on a sliding-fee scaled based on income. Participation in some programs is court-ordered.

In fiscal year 2008, FCS served 8,000 families and individuals in Central Maryland.

Locations

As of 2008 there were 13 FCS offices located in Baltimore City and the surrounding counties of Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Carroll, [10] Harford, and Howard. Some services are offered in the home or in community settings. Although general counseling and in-home assistance for the elderly and adult disabled are available throughout Central Maryland, not all services are offered in all jurisdictions.

SCS operates domestic violence programs in Baltimore and Carroll counties, and adult day centers in Carroll and Harford counties. Some specialized programs, such as the After School AKAdemy, Children's Permanency Program, Supervised Visitation and Exchange Program and Family Support Center, are only available in one location or area.

Accreditation and recognition

SCS is accredited by the Council on Accreditation (COA), an independent, international accrediting body for child and family service and behavioral healthcare organizations. [11] COA accredits both private organizations and government agencies.

In 2004 and 2005, the United Way honored FCS for its development of outcome models to measure the impact of its programs.

The Coalition of Geriatric Services (COGS) [12] in Howard County, Maryland, awarded Family and Children's Services the Community Partnership Award in 2004. In Baltimore City, the Commission on Aging and Retirement Education [13] presented the Barbara Mikulski Caregiver Award to FCS in 2005.

In 2008, the Family Caregiver Alliance issued the Rosalinde Gilbert Innovations in Alzheimer's Disease Caregiver Legacy Award [14] to the FCS Carroll County Adult Day Center for its Montessori-based exercise program for clients with mild to moderate dementia.

History

The organization known as Family and Children's Services of Central Maryland was the result of a combination of predecessor agencies dating back to 1849. [15]

The records from FCS predecessor agencies can be found in the Special Collections section of The Milton S. Eisenhower Library, The Johns Hopkins University (Ms. 360). Much of the content below is taken, with permission, from the archives.

Charity organizations began developing at a time when a major demographic shift was occurring in American society. As industrialization began to replace an agrarian economy, many citizens left their rural communities only to find themselves unprepared to deal with urban life. Later events in the nation's history, including wars and the Depression, also caused similar de-stabilization in the society. Effects of society in transition are most affecting to those without adequate economic resources. Poverty, illness, addictions, and desertions left families bereft of shelter, food, and fuel.

FCS is one of only nine social services organizations in Central Maryland to have earned accreditation by the Council on Accreditation (COA), an independent, international accrediting body for child and family service and behavioral healthcare organizations.

Early reformers saw a correlation between morality and the economic condition, but as the work with clients advanced, these assumptions were challenged. As the theory and practice of social work evolved, new approaches were used to solve the problems of welfare.

In the mid-nineteenth century, Baltimore Mayor Elijah Stansbury Jr. called for delegates from each of the city's wards to meet and plan for an efficient relief administration. The result was the formation of the Association for the Improvement of the Condition of the Poor (AICP) in 1849. The AICP was the third organization of its kind in the United States (after New York City and Brooklyn, NY).

In 1881, Daniel Coit Gilman, president of The Johns Hopkins University, helped to found the Charity Organization Society (COS) modeled on a similar agency in Boston. Its purpose was not to give relief per se but to combine and develop all the charitable resources in the community into a single agency. Service to the client might include a referral to another agency, church, or individual, and it usually included the concept of "friendly visiting" to give personal service in a client's home "to promote health, thrift, and to build up character." Among the COS members were Amos Griswald Warner, [16] Mary E. Richmond, [17] Mary Willcox (Brown) Glenn, John M. Glenn, and Dr. Jeffrey R. Brackett, and each one became known nationally for contributions to the development and practice of social work.

Other agencies founded during this period provided specialized services for particular groups: children, women, the African American population. After several decades it was recognized that combined resources and an allocation of public funds were necessary. This began a series of mergers.

The AICP and the COS were instrumental in bringing about legislation creating the Juvenile Court, compulsory school attendance laws, non-support laws, child labor laws, and licensing for boarding infants. The two agencies were formally incorporated as the Federated Charities (FC) in 1910. In 1911, the Legal Aid Bureau was organized as a department of the FC and remained so until it was separated as a single agency in 1929. During this period (c. 1900–1920), charity funding also became specialized and was administered by a single agency, the Baltimore Alliance (succeeded by the Community Chest in 1926).

In 1919, Federated Charities voted to change the name to Family Welfare Association. The primary goals of FC would be service to the family, including "securing medical treatment, finding employment, searching for missing husbands, straightening out domestic difficulties, instruction in household economics, and strengthening connections with church and relatives." Persons prominent in the Association during this period include Gaylord Lee Clark, Anna D. Ward, Doris Slothower, and Dorothy Pope.

Rehabilitative services were put aside during the early years of the Depression as the Agency struggled to aid families and at the same time to get the City and State to assume some responsibility. Gaylord Lee Clark, president of FWA in 1929, called upon the Governor to appoint a Commission to investigate the social welfare needs of the State. Along with the implementation of federal programs, this led to the present Maryland State Department of Welfare. When the Baltimore Emergency Relief Commission was set up in 1933 with a pipeline to federal funds, the FWA moved to resume its function, "the promotion of adequate family life through casework service."

Social work as a profession was advanced in the 1930s. Caseworkers began exploring new ideas regarding the psychology of human behavior, and community psychiatric services were tried.

In 1940, the Community Fund recommended a merger of four agencies. The Henry Watson Children's Aid Society and the FWA merged in 1942 (Annual Report, 1942). Briefly known as the Family Welfare and Henry Watson Children's Aid Society of Baltimore, the name more popularly was known as the Family and Children's Society. Final mergers joined the Society for the Protection of Children from Cruelty and Immorality and the Shelter for Aged and Infirm Colored Persons in 1943.

The Family and Children's Society emerged in 1943 as a multi-service agency. The Society's service to families was expanded to include medical, foster care, housekeeping, marriage counseling, adoptions, home finding, group counseling, and community mental health.

In 1985, the Family and Children's Society merged with the Maryland Children's and Family Services and is now known as the Family and Children's Services of Central Maryland. In 1998, the Family Life Center, in Howard County, merged with FCS. In 2020, FCS changed its name to Springboard Community Services. [4]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Orphanage</span> Residential institution devoted to the care of orphans

An orphanage is a residential institution, total institution or group home, devoted to the care of orphans and children who, for various reasons, cannot be cared for by their biological families. The parents may be deceased, absent, or abusive. There may be substance abuse or mental illness in the biological home, or the parent may simply be unwilling to care for the child. The legal responsibility for the support of abandoned children differs from country to country, and within countries. Government-run orphanages have been phased out in most developed countries during the latter half of the 20th century but continue to operate in many other regions internationally. It is now generally accepted that orphanages are detrimental to the emotional wellbeing of children, and government support goes instead towards supporting the family unit.

In relation to public services, the voluntary sector is the realm of social activity undertaken by non-governmental, not for profit organizations. This sector is also called the third sector, community sector, and nonprofit sector. "Civic sector" or "social sector" are other terms used for the sector, emphasizing its relationship to civil society. Voluntary sector activities are important in many areas of life, including social care, child care, animal welfare, sport and environmental protection.

The Community Chest of Hong Kong is an independent, nonprofit organization established on 8 November 1968 in Hong Kong. The Community Chest serves as an umbrella organization to provide grants to a wide range of community projects.

The Charity Organisation Societies were founded in England in 1869 following the 'Goschen Minute' that sought to severely restrict outdoor relief distributed by the Poor Law Guardians. In the early 1870s a handful of local societies were formed with the intention of restricting the distribution of outdoor relief to the elderly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adventist Development and Relief Agency</span> Humanitarian agency operated by the Seventh-day Adventist Church

The Adventist Development and Relief Agency International is a humanitarian agency operated by the Seventh-day Adventist Church for the purpose of providing individual and community development and disaster relief. It was founded in 1956, and it is headquartered in Silver Spring, Maryland, United States.

Children's Aid Societies (CAS) are certified non-governmental child protection organizations in Ontario, Canada which operate independently of the Ontario Ministry of Children, Community, and Youth Services to provide child protection services. The declared goal of CAS is to "promote the best interests, protection and well being of children".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zilpha Drew Smith</span> American social worker

Zilpha Drew Smith was an American social worker. She was a leading figure in the charity organization movement and in the professionalization of social work, in Boston and across the nation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Catholic Relief Services</span> Humanitarian agency from the USA

Catholic Relief Services (CRS) is the international humanitarian agency of the Catholic community in the United States. Founded in 1943 by the Bishops of the United States, the agency provides assistance to 130 million people in more than 110 countries and territories in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Eastern Europe.

The Jewish United Fund of Chicago (JUF) is the central philanthropic address of Chicago's Jewish community and one of the largest not-for-profit social welfare institutions in Illinois. JUF provides critical resources that bring food, refuge, health care, education and emergency assistance to 500,000 Chicagoans of all faiths and millions of Jews in Israel and around the world, funding a network of 100+ agencies, schools and initiatives.

The Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) is a nonprofit national association in the United States representing more than 2,500 individual members, as well as graduate and undergraduate programs of professional social work education. Founded in 1952, this partnership of educational and professional institutions, social welfare agencies, and private citizens is recognized by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation as the sole accrediting agency for social work education in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Boys & Girls Aid</span>

Boys & Girls Aid is a non-profit organization that provides services to children in crisis in the state of Oregon, United States.

Community organization or community based organization refers to organization aimed at making desired improvements to a community's social health, well-being, and overall functioning. Community organization occurs in geographically, psychosocially, culturally, spiritually, and digitally bounded communities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Catholic Charities USA</span> Network of charities with headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia

Catholic Charities USA is the national voluntary membership organization for Catholic Charities agencies throughout the United States and its territories. Catholic Charities USA is a member of Caritas Internationalis, an international federation of Catholic social service organizations. Catholic Charities USA is the national office of 167 local Catholic Charities agencies nationwide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jewish Board of Family and Children's Services</span> American nonprofit organization

The Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services is one of the United States' largest nonprofit mental health and social service agencies, and New York State's largest social services nonprofit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor</span>

The Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor (AICP) was a charitable organization in New York City, established in 1843 and incorporated in 1848 with the aim of helping the deserving poor and providing for their moral uplift. The Association was one of the most active and innovative charity organizations in New York, pioneering many private-public partnerships in education, healthcare and social services.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Richmond</span> American social worker

Mary Ellen Richmond (1861–1928) was an American social work pioneer. She is regarded as the mother of professional social work along with Jane Addams. She founded social case work, the first method of social work and was herself a Caseworker.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Foster care in the United States</span> System of non-parental care in America

Foster care is the term used for a system in which a minor who has been made a ward or a non-minor, typically aged 18–21, who volunteers for placement, is placed in a relative placement, a non-related extended family (NREFM) placement, a community family home, an institution, a group home (residential child care community, residential treatment center, etc. Relative, NREFM, and community caregivers certified by the state are typically referred to as "foster parents," "kin caregivers," "resource parents," or other local terms. The placement of the child is usually arranged through state or county social services. The institution, group home, or caregiver is reimbursed for the expenses related to caring for the child. The state via the family court and child protection agency stand in loco parentis to the minor, making all legal decisions, while the caregiver is responsible for the day-to-day care of the minor. Even while their child is in Care, typically birth parents retain Education and Medical rights and the right to contact with their child unless parental rights are terminated by the Court.

HASA is a social benefit 501(c)(3) organization located in Baltimore, Maryland, that specializes in facilitating communication. Established in 1926, the organization provides special education services through Gateway School, audiology and speech-language services through its Clinical Services Department, and interpreting services for the deaf through its CIRS Interpreting Department.

The Scientific Charity Movement was a movement that arose in the early 1870s in the United States to stop poverty. It sought to move the role of supporting the impoverished away from government and religious organizations and into the hands of Charity Organization Societies (COS). These Societies claimed the altruistic goals of lifting the poor out of poverty through the means of education and employment, and did make some strides to help young children involved in immoral underaged labor practices. However when it came to the COS's treatment of the "defective class" as they were labeled, the Scientific Charity Movement's other goals based in the popular post civil war social scientific theories of eugenics and social Darwinism came to light. Many of these "defective classes" were moved from the streets and into insane asylums where they were often experimented on by scientists of the time.

References

  1. 1 2 "Family and Children's Services of Central Maryland (Henry Watson Children's Aid Society of Baltimore), Inc. Archived 2014-12-21 at the Wayback Machine " Business Services. Maryland Department of Assessments and Taxation. Accessed on January 29, 2016.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "Form 990: Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax". Family & Children's Services of Central Maryland. Guidestar. June 30, 2014.
  3. 1 2 "Management and Boards Archived 2016-02-06 at the Wayback Machine ". Family & Children's Services of Central Maryland. Accessed on January 29, 2016.
  4. 1 2 "Our History". Springboard Community Services. Retrieved 2024-02-15.
  5. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2008-07-24. Retrieved 2009-03-19.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  6. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2008-07-24. Retrieved 2009-03-19.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  7. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-26. Retrieved 2009-03-19.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  8. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2009-03-25. Retrieved 2010-07-22.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  9. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2008-07-24. Retrieved 2009-03-19.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  10. ↑ http://www.carrollcountytimes.com/articles/2008/11/17/news/local_news/newsstory4.prt%5B%5D
  11. ↑ "COA - Credibility ::: Integrity ::: Achievement". Coanet.org. Archived from the original on 2011-09-30. Retrieved 2011-11-15.
  12. ↑ "Coalition of Geriatric Services - Home". Cogsmd.org. Retrieved 2011-11-15.
  13. ↑ Archived March 21, 2009, at the Wayback Machine
  14. ↑ "FCA:". Caregiver.org. Retrieved 2011-11-15.
  15. ↑ "Family and Children's Society Records (1849-1977)". Sheridan Libraries. June 1994. Archived from the original on 2007-09-24. Retrieved 2008-12-02.
  16. ↑ Warner, Amos Griswald, American Charities. A Study in Philanthropy and Economics, 1894, Elibron classics Replica Edition 2006, ISBN   0-543-91081-4
  17. ↑ "Mary Ellen Richmond". NASW Foundation. Archived from the original on 2017-01-19. Retrieved 2008-12-02.

Further reading


This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.