Workshops on Sibling Issues and Training on the Sibshop Model

[Guest guest]

Workshops on Sibling Issues and Training on the Sibshop Model

The Sibling Support Project is pleased to announce that we are now scheduling

workshops for 2004. Please share this announcement with families you know and

training directors, conference planners, coordinators of family services from

appropriate agencies.

Many agencies wisely value the families they serve and are committed to

providing family-centered care and services. However, even the most

family-friendly agencies often overlook brothers and sisters. Brothers and

sisters are too important to ignore, if for only these reasons:

*Siblings will be in the lives of family members with special needs longer than

anyone. Brothers and sisters will be there after parents are gone and special

education services are a distant memory. If they are provided with support and

information, they can help their sibs live dignified lives from childhood to

their senior years.

*Throughout their lives, brothers and sisters share many of the concerns that

parents of children with special needs experience, including isolation, a need

for information, guilt, concerns about the future, and caregiving demands.

Brothers and sisters also face issues that are uniquely theirs including

resentment, peer issues, embarrassment, and pressure to achieve.

*No classmate in an inclusive classroom will have a greater impact on the social

development of a child with a disability than brothers and sisters will. They

will be their siblings' life-long " typically developing role models. "

The Sibling Support Project is the United States' only national project

dedicated to the concerns of brothers and sisters of people with special health,

developmental and mental health concerns. We specialize in providing lively,

family-friendly, and highly rated workshops on sibling (and father and

grandparent!) issues to audiences of parents, service providers, university

staff and students, and siblings of all ages.

We've conducted workshops on sibling issues in all 50 states, Canada, Ireland,

Japan, New Zealand, and England and have helped establish over 200 replications

of our award-winning Sibshop program in eight countries. Our books for families

include Sibshops, Views from Our Shoes, Living with a Brother or Sister with

Special Needs, and Uncommon Fathers. And our work and publications have been

featured in newspapers (Washington Post, New York Times), magazines (Exceptional

Parent, Sesame Street Parent, Reader's Digest), professional publications (JASH,

Journal of Pediatric Psychology, The American Academy of Pediatrics News), and

television (Brazelton on Parenting) across the United States.

We'd welcome an opportunity to present at your agency or your next conference or

training event. We'll show you how parents and providers can decrease siblings'

concerns and increase their opportunities, how to create " sibling friendly "

services, and even how to start your own Sibshop.

Addressing siblings' concerns benefits everyone: brothers, sisters, parents,

agencies, taxpayers and especially the family member who has special needs. In

many important ways, brothers and sisters ARE the future--and are too important

to ignore.

If you would like to learn more about our workshops, seminars, and keynotes

please call or contact us by email and we'd be happy to send you more

information. Our schedule is beginning to fill up, but we still have openings.

Don Meyer, Director

Sibling Support Project of the Arc of the United States

6512 23rd Ave NW, #213

Seattle, WA 98117

206-297-6368

donmeyer@...

www.thearc.org/siblingsupport/

our online training calendar: www.calsnet.net/sibshop