One family befriends many at-risk kids

For Lorraine Sanik and Jonathan Fischer of Newtonville, Mass., working with at-risk children is a vocation they learned from their parents and one that they have passed on to their daughter, Abby Fischer, CHEP ’09.

Sanik, whose mother was a special education teacher for underprivileged kids in Gary, Ind., serves as director of an early intervention program for infants and toddlers. Fischer, whose father was a minister, is a social worker for adolescents with severe emotional illnesses. And Abby, a UD sophomore majoring in elementary teacher education, already has made four trips to Nicaragua, where she distributes school supplies purchased with money she has earned through yard sales and other fundraising activities.

Sanik and Fischer met in the mid-1970s when they were both working as teachers at a day care center. Although the work was rewarding (and she has stayed in touch with two of her infants who are now young parents themselves), Sanik thought her energy and talents could be put to better use. “I had no doubts that these children of upper middle class families were going to do well whether I worked with them or not,” she says.
When she heard about an opportunity to set up an early intervention program in the neighboring county, she says she knew it was “exactly” the job for her. With a master’s degree in education and academic credentials in early childhood and special education instruction, Sanik was hired and started the program with a grant of just $20,000. Nearly 30 years later, the early intervention program has an operating budget of more than $1 million, serves about 500 kids a year and employs 34 special educators, social workers, nurses, physical therapists, speech therapists, occupational therapists and nutritionists.

Massachusetts has led the way in federal legislation that funds early intervention initiatives, and Sanik’s agency, Thom Child & Family Services, serves as a national model. Her staff starts with an at-home evaluation to assess the child’s needs and then establishes a plan to meet those needs with a variety of possible services. “If the child is language-delayed, we send a speech therapist to the home at least once a week, so they can work with both child and parent,” Sanik says.

Group programs for children and parents, including two Spanish-language groups, also are offered, along with services at a local homeless shelter and health clinics. Most important, Sanik says, is the connection that is made with parents.

“If you help parents feel good about what they’re doing, let them know how to get resources, teach them how to be an advocate for themselves and their children, it makes a difference. Supporting the parent supports the child as well as the work you do with the individual child,” she says.

Fischer, likewise, works closely with parents in his role as a social worker for the Home for Little Wanderers, a well-known, nonprofit child welfare agency serving the Boston area. He is part of The Collaborative, a program that pulls together all kinds of social service professionals, school personnel, therapists, family members and other supportive individuals to help children with severe emotional illness.

Known as a “wrap-around” program because it surrounds the child and family with all levels and kinds of support, The Collaborative treats children up to age 19.
Through plenty of paperwork, phone calls, home visits and group sessions, Fischer helps pull together the resources and people to address wide-ranging emotional needs of his young clients and their families. A short list of examples reveals the challenges he faces on a daily basis: an 11-year-old boy who was born drug-addicted and later sexually and physically abused in foster care who is now acting out, running away and making false accusations of abuse about his adoptive mother; a 16-year-old boy suffering post-traumatic stress after one neighborhood shooting killed a friend and another shooting wounded a relative; an adolescent boy whose fearful mom needs support to help him deal with gang and drug exposure in their neighborhood; and a 12-year-old girl whose mental health problems mirror the ups and downs of her mother’s depression and suicidal feelings. Others are affected by conditions such as Asperger Syndrome and obsessive compulsive disorder.

A “typical” day might be spent helping a mother look at alternative school programs for her 14-year-old who has just “aged-out” of another program and supervising a group of adolescent boys who gather to play sports or discuss issues such as peer relationships, school and family or racial and ethnic issues.

Both Sanik and Fischer see their share of sad and difficult situations while doing their best to make a difference. For her, it may be the effects of premature birth or cerebral palsy; for him, the struggles of a single parent whose child has been affected, not by poor parenting, but simply by circumstances beyond their control.

“Seeing what other parents have had to go through, we appreciate what we have and how well our own children are doing,” Fischer says. Their son, Michael, who graduated from Tulane University, is successfully working in business. Abby spent the summer volunteering with the infants and toddlers in Sanik’s program while preparing for her next trip to Nicaragua and her sophomore year at UD.
“We work with parents who have had to adjust to things they could never have imagined and parents who are doing the best they can in a tough culture,” Fischer says. “We’ve been fortunate to have good kids with good values, who have learned to look beyond house and home to help others.”

—Sharon Huss Roat, AS ’87