ADL Assistant Project Director Pam Autio provided Miller Early Childhood Initiative Training to fifteen foster parents connected with the Casa de Esperanza social service agency.

Casa de Esperanza is a non-profit organization that provides help for children and their families in the Greater Houston area and surrounding counties whose lives have been disrupted by abuse, neglect, homelessness, poverty, substance abuse, parental incarceration and/or HIV-infection. One of its programs involves adults providing foster care for a diverse group of children.

The adults, who come from all over the country to provide the foster service, also are a diverse group. The Miller Early Childhood Initiative workshops help caregivers learn skills to help very young children gain comfort with and respect for diversity.

They participated in the workshop to raise their cultural awareness, and be more responsive to the children in their care.   Autio said about the group, “I admire what they’re doing because it takes a special person to devote a year of his or her life to that kind of service, and it’s great that they realize that respecting differences is an important part of the foster parent training.”

To date, the Southwest Region has presented 137 Miller Early Childhood Initiative Workshops, touching approximately 1600 adults and 16,000 children.