Page 25 - BTC Yearbook 2016

United Way for Greater Austin Touchpoint Group.

United Way for Greater Austin’s Success By 6 Program started providing the Individual Level
Touchpoint Training to the Austin community in 2008. Currently, there are 15 active
Touchpoints Trainers that are part of our team. Two are nurses, two are private therapists, one is
an early care and education teacher, four work in the early childhood departments in local school
districts, and the remaining members are coordinators and managers of a variety of early
childhood non-profit organizations. The diverse experience of our trainers is very important to us
as we are impacting a broad group of practitioners and families.

Success By 6 targets families with children between the ages of birth through five years. Some
services may also encompass pregnant women. Families also experience one or more of the
following additional risk factors: Teen parents; Parents with less than a high school education;
English Language Learners; Parents unable to form successful attachments with their children;
Domestic violence; and Involvement with Child Protective Services (CPS).

All the organizations involved in our community collaborative and participating in the
Touchpoints training provide direct services to families and children. In addition, many of the
agencies focus on low-income, minority, or otherwise vulnerable populations.

There is a real range in practitioners that are impacted by the Touchpoints training because we
really see Touchpoints as helping to ground our broad coalition of partners philosophically –
providing common language and ideas for practitioners across professional roles. We believe
that the Touchpoints approach will not only help a multidisciplinary cohort of professionals work
with families in more collaborative and culturally respectful ways, but will help us come together
as a supportive community of professionals as well. Attendees typically include home visitors
and nurses, parent educators, early care and education and preschool teachers & administrators,
therapists, and health providers.

Since 2008, we’ve been able to train approximately 300 early childhood providers in 30 different
agencies. This has had a great impact on our community as providers have taken the Touchpoints
concepts back to their agencies and integrated them into their practice. Due to a recent grant,
we’ve been able to expand our training team and are able to offer the Individual Level
Touchpoints trainings for free or for a small fee. This has removed the financial barrier for many
agencies and has allowed other agencies to send more providers to each training. Another
highlight is that several large home visiting and parent education agencies have also started to
sign-up all of their new staff members to the training each year as they see it as a vital part of
their philosophy and approach.