The State Reintegration Program (SRP) provides intensive aftercare services to adjudicated youth leaving the Youth Development Center/Youth Forestry Camp (YDC/YFC) system.

 

VisionQuest's Mission

 

VisionQuest is an employee-owned, comprehensive national youth services organization that adheres to the highest professional standards in providing innovative intervention services to at-risk youth and families.

 

We provide extraordinary experiences and relationships that allow youth, families, and staff to redefine and reach their highest potential.

 

SRP values that drive the work we do:

 

Collaboration: The success of reintegration depends on collaborative treatment planning among the youth, his/her family, the YDC/YFC treatment team, local juvenile probation officers, host and home schools, and community partners. In order to be effective, this planning must start at the disposition stage. For a State Reintegration Program (SRP) to be the most successful, it must have the immediate capability and capacity to be the "link" between the YDC/YFC system and county-based probation staff. Working closely with county juvenile probation officers immediately following the disposition, ensures early identification of systemic barriers to successful reintegration as well as adherence to Balanced and Restorative Justice (BARJ) principles. Such barriers, which must be identified early in order for successful reintegration to take place, while ensuring Offender Accountability, Competency Development, and Community Protection.

 

Community Awareness: Understanding from where one comes, is crucial in not only treating a youth and their individual needs, but in how he/she will respond during their residential placement and his/her ability to carry lessons learned back to his/her specific community with its own set of street rules and norms. Reintegration workers that are locally based can bring the individual community to the YDC/YFC. They can serve to help YDC/YFC staff understand the community where the youth lived before placement and will return to upon his/her return. By sharing experiences, as well things that bind communities such as the local food, sports teams, and high schools, youth can feel that staff understand them, enabling youth to be more likely to successfully receive and accept treatment services.

 

Single Plan: Under Pennsylvania's reintegration effort, system partners agreed that a "single plan" that is probation driven, and includes input from the YDC/YFC staff, family, youth, and educational partners, be created to ensure continuity of case management for juveniles in placement and for reintegration. The use of reintegration staff create the ability to build and maintain relationships with local probation departments, supporting the creation and implementation of a single plan. Reintegration staff serve as the nucleus for information-sharing, collecting information from the youth, the family, and educational and community partners so that integrated planning can happen at the YDC/YFC and back within the community. In so doing, the reintegration staff facilitates the process through which everyone who needs to be involved in the planning is "on the same page."

 

Family Involvement: Families must be engaged early in the planning process and visitation by families is crucial to a youth's success. Reintegration workers work with families and ensure that any well-being issues are resolved while the youth is in placement. Through continuous efforts to link families to services in the community, the reintegration worker can build a trusting relationship with the family and tailor services that will meet the needs of the youth upon his/her return home.

 

Education: A smooth transition back to a youth's home school is necessary and can be the basis for a youth's success. While in placement, SRP staff can look into charter schools, higher education, or trade school programs that best meet the youth's educational needs/aspirations.

 

Employment: It is paramount that immediately upon discharge, given their age and probable lack of higher educational opportunities, that youth be enrolled in local community-based job readiness programs in which they can gain the basic skills they need to find and retain gainful employment.

 

Provide Structure and Guidance: SRP staff encourage all youth to get involved in community service related activities, recreational actives and other local programs/services of interest. We take a client focused approach in that we emphasize how we truly want to identify activities that the youth wants to participate in.
Keeping busy and involved in productive activities is one of the things that youth tell us is most likely to keep them from re-offending. In addition, SRP staff will introduce clients to positive role models in the community and mentors to be a resource for them after completing our program.

 

Reward Positive Behavior: We have an incentive program for youth in the community who are doing well with their reintegration plans. Often times we tend to focus on what youth are doing wrong and acknowledging successes such as good school attendance, meeting employment goals, etc. improve confidence and moral. Points are tallied on a monthly basis so youth can earn gift cards based on their successes with the reintegration process and for meeting their goals.