- Bay Trail Middle School, 1760 Scribner Road, Penfield, NY 14526
- Interested in a specific aspect of adoption. View workshop tracks.pdf
Why attend?
LEARN about the unique issues of foster care and adoption.
COLLECT helpful tips for parenting foster and adopted children.
GATHER information to begin the adoption process or to learn about becoming a foster parent
FIND information and resources to search for biological relatives.
NETWORK with others in foster and adoptive relationships.
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Dr.
Joyce Maguire Pavao
Joyce Maguire Pavao, Ed.D., LCSW, LMFT, is the founder and CEO of Center For Family Connections, Inc. (CFFC - est. 1995), Adoption Resource Center (ARC - est. 1973), Pre/Post Adoption Consulting Team (PACT - est. 1978), and Family Connections Training Institute (FACT - est. 1995), all of which are in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Dr. Pavao serves on many boards across the country, and has received numerous awards throughout her career. Dr. Pavao has done extensive training, both nationally and internationally. She has worked closely with individuals, couples, and families on issues related to adoption, foster care, guardianship and kinship, as well as complex families formed through reproductive technology, single parent families, gay and lesbian families, and families through remarriage.
Her constant chant is that adoption is about finding families for children, not about finding children for families. Although she is a family therapist with empathy for all parties, she keeps her focus on the best interests of the child. Her other mantra is that it takes a community to hold a family and the wider community needs to understand the Family of Adoption.
She has developed models for treatment and for training using her systemic, intergenerational, and developmental framework The Normative Crises in the Development of the Adoptive Family (Family Therapy News, 1982) and her book The Family of Adoption (Beacon Press, 1998) has received high acclaim.
She states that more than her degrees and honors, her most valuable credential is that she has experienced life as an adopted person and that she has great love and respect for both her birth and adoptive families.
Dr. Jaiya John
Dr. Jaiya John is the founder and Executive Director of Soul Water Rising, a human relations mission devoted to compassion and understanding two of humankind’s most challenging endeavors. Since 1990 he has served as a professional speaker, consultant, poet, author, and youth mentor. Dr. Jaiya’s passionate, poetic presentations combine spiritual and social science insights. He has addressed thousands of youth and adults internationally, always with the intent of stirring the soul to remember itself. This work is truly his mission, ministry, and life. He has authored the award-winning memoir, Black Baby White Hands: A View from the Crib; Reflection Pond, a meditation on identity, culture, and healing in children separated from original family; and Beautiful, a poetic companion piece to Reflection Pond. Dr. Jaiya was a professor of social psychology at Howard University (1995-1998) and served as associate director for the National Center on Permanency for African American Children (1999-2001).
Dr. Jaiya was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Immediately placed in foster care and eventually adopted, Dr. Jaiya’s childhood branded in him a burning passion for giving his life to improve the way human beings relate to each other. Dr. Jaiya studied psychology at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon, and earned his doctorate from the University of California, Santa Cruz in social psychology with a focus on identity development. He lived during 1988 in the nation of Nepal, where his research on Tibetan medicine instilled within him an appreciation for
holistic concepts of physical, emotional and spiritual health. Being of not only African but also Seminole, Blackfoot, and Cherokee descent; and having grown up in the midst of the Southwest’s American Indian and Latino communities, Dr. Jaiya has a deep appreciation for the spiritual and communal passions that spring from these worlds. This spirit he ingrains in his messages about our social world. Dr. Jaiya believes that in every moment of life, each of us is a teacher and a student and that our ultimate purpose is to honor the interconnected web of life.
HOW A CHILD DEFINES BELONGING
Adoption Resource Network ² November 8, 2008
Jaiya John’s poetic keynote celebrates the promise and the impact of adoption and similar family arrangements. Jaiya defines culture as a person’s way of existing in the world. This definition brings every child under the same tree; a tree rooted in our human need to feel as though we are beautiful (worthy, valid, positively unique and similar) and as though we belong (possessing an honored purpose within the collective). The challenge we face is in learning to honor children in the context of their purposeful individual uniqueness. Honoring children creates serenity, healing, and growth in each family member. In this holistic cultural approach, families learn to celebrate each member’s unique heritage, life story, and identity as a pathway to healthy relationships.
Throughout the afternoon Jaiya will conduct a book signing of his child service-related titles Legendary; Beautiful; Reflection Pond; and Black Baby White Hands: A View from the Crib. Learn more about Jaiya John and Soul Water Rising’s global human relations mission at www.soulwater.org.
HOW A CHILD DEFINES BELONGING
Workshop Session
Jaiya’s workshop session will not be a “workshop” in the conventional sense, but rather a question-and-answer discussion addressing issues that were raised for participants during Jaiya’s keynote presentation. This will be a conversational session, without exercises or handouts. Here is your chance for hear-to-heart on the issues that are significant to you.
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Anthony Toombs and Jesse Howes - Project Joy
Trauma and the Barriers to Healthy Childhood Development
Steve Gross, Founder, Project Joy
Project Joy’s innovative trainings focus on the importance of play in shaping social and emotional development, and highlight the barriers that get in the way of healthy play for children, including the impact of early childhood trauma, multiple moves in foster care, failed adoptive placements, and poverty. Trainees are equipped with the tools to use play as a therapeutic process with children to help them heal, grow and thrive.
Through play, children express themselves, build healthy relationships, and prepare to successfully meet life’s challenges. Project Joy’s approach provides direct care workers with the tools to foster healthy play, providing at-risk children with the support they need to overcome trauma, grow and thrive. Steve Gross has provided this training to Hunter College School of Social Work’s Post-Graduate Certificate in Adoption Therapy for two years, understanding that the children in foster care and adoptive placements are often survivors of significant trauma.
This training will provide direct care workers with resources to help strengthen and heal their children through playfulness. This training will increase understanding of trauma and its impact on children and adults, our understanding of the role of playfulness, and how it can serve as a protective factor. The presenters will discuss playfulness in four domains: affective component, social component, psychosocial component, and cognitive component; utilizing playfulness as an antidote to exposure to trauma, including the use of body-oriented activities and games for families to use with their children with the development of playfulness as a treatment goal.
Project Joy
Project Joy is working towards the day that all children can reach their full potential. A non-profit organization, Project Joy is dedicated to fostering the healthy development of young children who are at risk. Through innovative training retreats, Project Joy provides teachers and childcare providers with the resources they need to strengthen and heal their children through play. Established in Boston in 1989, Project Joy has expanded to national scope, currently supporting children and their caretakers from Boston to Biloxi and beyond.
Project Joy’s programs use a combination of exuberant games, story telling, yoga, and movement to help children joyfully explore and create in a safe, loving environment. Our programs are designed to help children to grow and thrive through training of direct care staff.
Project Joy’s innovative trainings focus on the importance of play in shaping social and emotional development. We equip our trainees with the tools to use play as a therapeutic process with children. Our trainings also highlight the barriers that get in the way of healthy play for children, including the impact of early childhood trauma and poverty.
To ensure you receive Conference Information next year, please send your contact information (name, mailing address, phone number, email address) to Cecelia Spinelli, Adoption Resource Network at Hillside Children’s Center, at cspinell@hillside.com.
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- Trauma Impact Flyer