F2F PARENT MENTOR DESCRIPTION

Summary of Position

The F2F Parent Mentor is a trained volunteer parent of a child with special needs who has knowledge of and will support Indiana’s First Steps system mission and vision. The Parent Mentor is directly responsible to the Parent Liaison in the local First Steps cluster. He/she will perform those duties that are outlined below.

Family Support

F2F Parent Mentors will be utilized by the regional Parent Liaisons for the sole purpose of providing peer support to families in the particular cluster where the Parent Mentor and the family are located. We define peer support as encouragement, moral support and empathetic sharing between the trained Parent Mentor and the referred family. Our hope is to help families feel less isolated and more confident about themselves through the relationship that is established. This approach assumes that families who have experienced disability can better understand and relate to individuals trying to deal with their own family member’s disability.

As a Parent Mentor, beyond your one-on-one conversations, you may refer families to other forms of peer support such as:

• Local Support Groups
• Play Groups
• Parent’s Nights Out
• Special Needs Ministries

Outreach

As leaders in your community, you likely have many opportunities to connect with families formally and informally through your family’s daily life. As a Parent Mentor under F2F you will be asked to refer other parents from your community, who would benefit from information and support, to the Parent Liaison serving your cluster. This referral will be made by giving contact information for the Parent Liaison serving the local area. As a result of the family’s contact with a Parent Liaison, families may be referred back to you or to another Parent Mentor to offer peer support if this is something that is requested or needed.

Reporting

Parent Mentors will be asked to keep a communication log for every family that they are matched with. This will be turned into the Parent Liaison upon completion of the required 4 contacts. No other reporting will be required.

FAMILY INVOLVEMENT FUND

FAMILY to FAMILY is a UTS-Indiana's Unified Training System collaborative project of the Indiana University, Indiana Institute on Disability and Community, Early Childhood Center and
ASK-About Special Kids.
Funding provided by Indiana FSSA, DDRS, First Steps Early Intervention System.