Thursday Evening Pathways – Summer 2023

Pathways is an 8-session curriculum

Eligibility:

Due to our current funding guidelines, outlined by the Ministry, participants must be an adoptive parent (including parents pre adoption finalization) or a foster-to-adopt parent, and must have adopted (or be fostering-to-adopt) through a children’s aid society, to attend our free Pathways program.

Please note – we are working to make Pathways available to all permanency parents (Customary Care, Kinship, Legal Guardian, International Adoptions, Private Adoptions), and hope to be able to offer them soon.  If you would like to be kept in the loop on when these new offerings become available, please be sure to sign-up for our newsletter.

Location: Online via Zoom (The Zoom link will be emailed to registrants closer to the event date; please see below for technical requirements).

Time: Thursday Evenings; 6:30pm to 9:30pm

Dates: 

• Session 1: July 6, 2023
• Session 2: July 13, 2023
• Session 3: July 20, 2023
• Session 4: July 27, 2023
• Session 5: August 3, 2023
• Session 6: August 10, 2023
• Session 7: August 17, 2023
• Session 8: August 24, 2023
• Session 9 (Decoding): September 14, 2023

Additional Details

Who: This training is for parents and caregivers where a placement has already occurred.

Cost: This course is being offered at NO cost to participants thanks to funding from the Ontario Ministry of Children, Community and Social Services.

Technical & set-up requirement: 

• Laptop or desktop computer with functioning webcam and microphone capabilities.
• Strong/stable internet connection with a speed of at least 10mbps
  
• In order to preserve families’ privacy and comfort levels, anyone other than another Pathways participant, should not be in the same room with you while participating in a Pathways Zoom session; this includes children and teens.

Trainer(s):

Fatima Di Valentin, MSW, RSW
[email protected]
Fatima Di Valentin, MSW, RSW is a clinical social worker in private practice that specializes in trauma and anxiety in children and adults with a personal permanency journey. Fatima has a research interest in how adverse childhood experiences relate to chronic pain. Fatima is an experienced educator in both college and in the community.  She has over 15 years experience in the child welfare system and has worked in building permanency for children in each phase of the process.  Fatima is the mother to two biological children and has welcomed kin children into her family.

Jennifer Phair, BSW (East)
[email protected]
Jennifer Phair graduated from the University of Western Ontario, with an Honours Bachelor of Social Work Degree in 1993.  Since that time, Jennifer has dedicated her career to the child welfare sector, and improving the lives of children, youth and families.  She is currently an Adoption Supervisor at Durham Children’s Aid Society.   With over 29 years of extensive child welfare experience as a front-line worker and service supervisor, she brings a breadth of knowledge of the child welfare system, from intake, to supporting families in an ongoing capacity, to child and youth services and 9 years of direct experience in adoption, both as a practitioner and supervisor.  Jennifer has attended the Adoption Competency Training and has a strong commitment to permanency and adoption journeys.

Certificate: A certificate of completion is available after the offering is complete.

To see other Pathways offerings in Ontario, click here to go to our events page.

Can’t attend any of these offerings? Click here to be notified about the next round.

Note: Ontario’s PRIDE curriculum is equivalent to The Kinship Center’s Pathways to Permanence 1 curriculum.

Detailed Information about Pathways 2

Click here for detailed information on Pathways 2.

© ACT: An Adoption and Permanency Curriculum for Child Welfare and Mental Health Professionals and Pathways to Permanence 2: Parenting Children who have Experienced Trauma and Loss are copyrights of Kinship Center, a member of Seneca Family of Agencies in California. Through a partnership with Seneca Family of Agencies, Adoption Council of Ontario owns the exclusive Ontario license to ACT and Pathways 2.