In a few short weeks, Rowan County DSS will host their last implementation meeting for the Partnering for Excellence (PFE) initiative. Rowan County DSS has been working in partnership with Cardinal Innovations for the last seven years to implement the PFE pathway among their staff and improve the "trauma informedness" of their community. Building a trauma informed culture within the agency and among community members and stakeholders is much more than providing education and improving awareness, it is also about responsiveness. When it comes building a trauma informed community culture, it is about assisting the community in their ability through both personal and professional interactions to identify, respond, and build service continuums for those impacted by trauma in the community. Over the past seven years Rowan County DSS has dedicated countless hours toward this end; with a large focus over the last two years being on sustainability of these efforts.
It is well documented that a huge concern for many projects supported by time limited funding is that there tends to be a lack of focus during “funding years” on the projects/initiatives continued success. Unfortunately, this often leaves communities unable to sustain successes and improvements brought on by the projects. To combat this, over the last two years Rowan County DSS, Cardinal Innovations, and Benchmarks’ PFE staff have focused our efforts on continued sustainability of the project. Working with project stakeholders to develop sustainable trauma and resiliency training programs for DSS staff as well as the community, building out continuous quality improvement and fidelity monitoring processes for PFE providers, and establishing data collection and monitoring processes that are efficient but not overly burdensome on staff with already hefty loads.
This focus on sustainability has been vital in ensuring the partnership remains on track with project goals and objectives. Simultaneously, local project leadership has been remained extremely grounded and “realistic” through this planning process. Acknowledging many initiatives often go awry due to unforeseeable or “plan-able” major system overhauls or changes in policy (hello Medicaid Transformation and FFPSA 😊), leadership, and staff. As a result, a good amount of this sustainability planning has included a great deal of focus on how to maintain open cross-system communication to thwart barriers and roadblocks that may arise. In addition to “planning ahead”, and ensuring there is an infrastructure in place for continued technical assistance in place from Benchmarks to assist the partnership in navigating any issues that arise as well as new and changing landscapes that may impact project goals and outcomes.
In sum, while we will miss seeing the beaming faces of our partners at Rowan County DSS and Cardinal Innovations, we are so glad to be able to assist them as they move to the next phase of this amazing work. We are beyond grateful for our RowCard partnership and the contributions you have all made to the TiC, TaC, TrC!
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