AMINA KRUCK: So, now we're doing the wrapup piece. Questions and answers. AUDIENCE MEMBER: I was curious about the supervision for peer mentors. Do you meet with them on a weekly bases for supervision or is it kind of phone check ins or if there's an issue? AMINA KRUCK: All three. APRIL REED: Yeah. All three they're required to give us an update at the end of the month because that is when they are doing their report about hours and mileage and what the activities have been but, if there's something going on, I can be doing research for somebody that needs resources and we might talk to her three times that week. Depends on what sort of support mentors and mentees are getting. AMINA KRUCK: Some mentors are cruising along with one consumer but maybe the next consumer they need to talk more because of what's going on with that consumer. They just don't know what to do or they don't feel like they're making progress or that kind of thing. APRIL REED: It's really as needed but we do check in with them. That's part of the evaluation process as well as doing that document checking. AMINA KRUCK: As a supervisor I have a hard time getting ahold of April. APRIL REED: That is true. And I'm usually late to meetings too. AMINA KRUCK: I'm really mad because she comes late to my department meeting. So I'm figuring out for her maybe texting is I good idea but she doesn't have her cell phone with her all the time but she's on the phone so much of the time interacting with people. AMINA KRUCK: Wait a minute, do we have sound yet? AUDIENCE MEMBER: I really like the idea that you recruit and just because there's someone in your center with a disability, that doesn't mean they're automatically going to become a mentor. I think appropriate mentors are important. If you put someone who is struggling with their own disability to try to mentor somebody and they have challenges, and they have maybe a negative attitude or you know that's going to be really traumatizing. AMINA KRUCK: That's right. One of the surest qualities to put someone in a no column is someone who is feeling like a victim. People who cannot listen people who are still in that process of feeling like a victim are in the no category. And your best leaders, I'm just co-counseling are often reluctant leaders, so we always have to keep our eyes open and talking to our staff about who you know, who have we got that's really got good skills and as was said right now we actually need more mentees referred to us for the wonderful mentors that we've got. But there were others times when we were really needing mentors. And we will advertise in our newsletter, we'll tell mentor stories so they know what they're getting into. And then we'll see, you know, who we get. But you're absolutely right. It's not just for everybody. They're not ready for it. APRIL REED: And I think too, somebody who is maybe more sarcastic or some bitterness, anger. Those are all kinds of things that could be damaging to a mentee. So you really want to make sure that you're screening for those kind of personality traits with your potential mentors. AMINA KRUCK: Other comments, questions? In the manual there are forms for, like, mileage. So we'll reimburse they have to turn in their time that they volunteer, remember, we're tracking that for our accountability for the financial support of the program. And then we do pay mileage or bus expenses or dial-a-ride expenses if they want and it's up to them and they know we teach them how to request that reimbursement and there's a form that they fill out. Some of them do and some don't and it's really not based on the income they have. It's interesting, some people take pride not asking for that. AUDIENCE MEMBER: On the ILRU Web site are there additional forms like you said as far as mentors turning in a report on a monthly basis as far as their time? I imagine you're also tracking with goals perhaps that they're working on so that can be input into your database. So is that information available or can you describe what goes into that? APRIL REED: Most of the forms you would need or use are in the back of our peer mentor training manual. So you have it already and if you want it like electronically, it is available on the ILRU Web site. For goal tracking because we have staff working with the mentee, they will track some of the goals, they do the goal updates and the database and I keep like a hard copy note of the goals and I'll make notes in the database for those kind of things. AUDIENCE MEMBER: This is a second part of that. Okay. Thank you. Some of the examples you gave is that a consumer could be working on three different goals. But maybe with their mentor they're only working on one particular goal. So I don't know if the staff person is always going to know that when they're doing the reporting. That's what my question was is how are you getting that information from the mentor to the staff person and to input into the system? Is that through your Google Docs? AMINA KRUCK: She makes a note in the same database that the staff is putting a note in under a consumer's name, she's putting a note in for the peer mentor and what they reported they've been working on that week. So they can see it. APRIL REED: So I'm putting that in so that the staff can see that so they'll know how many hours did my consumer get of mentoring this month? I also will send updates by email if there's something an important update or something critical that I want them to be aware so I can always send those notes and they'll check in with me and they're doing the evaluations so remember they're doing the evaluation forms we are asking what's the goal you're working on with your peer mentor what's the progress. Do you feel like you're making progress? Are there new goals? So the evaluation forms the staff use help them get those updates on goals and what the status are from the consumer, yeah. AMINA KRUCK: Ultimately it's from the consumer's perspective which is the most important one and their perspective may not be the same as the mentors. APRIL REED: And the staff will send out a link to the evaluation or they'll do it with somebody. But I always see those results and so do they. So we can look at, well, the staff say well, the consumer said this. Let me see what the mentor said. They have access to that information and so do I so we can look and compare to make sure everything is where they would want it to be for their consumer. Other questions? We have to make copies and interoffice copies to each other so we stepped it up a little bit technology wise. AUDIENCE MEMBER: My question is a little different. I'm wondering when you have other volunteers come in to ABIL for other types of things besides the mentoring program, do you handle those as well or does somebody else handle them or AMINA KRUCK: All except for the sports and fitness center that handle their own volunteer and volunteer hours. But yeah, she also same thing those volunteers also turn in volunteer sheets and part of that volunteer sheet there is a column where there's like a place for supervisor or somebody whether it's that staff person supervising them or like I've done a couple because of some events that I've done or whatever Improbable Theater Company figuring out the person that's the director initials to verify those are the hours. And again, we won't reimburse mileage unless we're getting volunteer hours turned in. APRIL REED: Good example would be this week I have a volunteer working with our marketing staff. So I'm trained supervise the volunteer. The staff had a need. They requested that I said here's what we have available. They picked who they wanted to come in and so they're supervising him on his day-to-day work for them. I'll get a note about the hours at the end of the month. And you know, they'll keep me updated on the progress. Do they meet them again next week, was going on with this project. So I'm just more facilitating the interaction once we get somebody started working on the project. AUDIENCE MEMBER: I know we were talking about perceptions that you use paid staff and not volunteers. Can you give some more examples that you might not think of as far as general administrative duties. AMINA KRUCK: We're using volunteers. What is it that Brant does for PAS and timesheets? APRIL REED: Well Brant is doing for our PAS department, one of our volunteers, Brant, he's sorting authorizations he's doing filing. That's what he does for them, for PSA. He also will come in sometimes and help our I&R coordinator update community resource. So we have a couple volunteers that help with that. She gets all these great lists and things of different community resources, they're getting on the Web sites of these agencies and verifying that we have the correct information. Things like that that she wouldn't have time to do because she's on I&R calls with people. AMINA KRUCK: And what is the volunteer that's working with the marketing guy doing. APRIL REED: The volunteer is working with our marketing program and they have a project where they are getting on every CIL’s Web site and they want to know what are other CILs doing with their logos, what are their Web sites looking like. Do they have a newsletter, do they have an e-newsletter because that's going to give them ideas of our branding. That's a lot of work. So we have two or three volunteers coming in and doing that. AMINA KRUCK: They might be helping us put packets together for presentation, stuffing envelopes, our PAS department sends out 2,000 time cards every week. And that's also an opportunity for me to put a flyer in about their earned income tax credit or volunteer income tax site or get out of the vote and so they'll be folding those and stuffing those in the envelope. Those are the kinds of things sometimes there's a conference that we're doing with partners and they ask for help to do the registration for the event at the event. Or to be there to be sight guides when the council on the blind has their conference. We have several mentors there to help get food out to people and sight guides and help them go back and forth to the restroom or whatever it is that they're needing. So those are some examples. APRIL REED: Just to mention too about general volunteering. We're very careful that we don't want this to turn into somebody's part-time job. For us volunteering is a chance to come help out. We don't want to take advantage of people. We don't want to turn it into we're getting free labor. AMINA KRUCK: She doesn't. I do. APRIL REED: No, but for example, you know, the PAS department, they send out those 2,000 time sheets every week. We come in and help one week. AMINA KRUCK: One week out of the month. APRIL REED: So we're giving them a break but we're not expecting volunteers to come in and do the work of staff and be there 24 hours a day. AMINA KRUCK: Soon we'll have them some volunteers will come in to help us make calls for get out the vote calls, those kinds of things. Microphone. She holds her hand up to her mouth to talk to us, that's great. Great, long day. AUDIENCE MEMBER: Do you use CILs for software in your center. Do you know what that is, do you have that? AMINA KRUCK: database. AUDIENCE MEMBER: So at the end of the month when you get all the hours, do you put it into your database for credit and that's your job? APRIL REED: Yeah right. Yeah. I do the data entry for the hours and notes under the files about the progress. AMINA KRUCK: I've tried to get her to let a program aide and there was one volunteer we had that worked for a long time with April and did some higher level things a little bit like that and she really knew it well and she was in between jobs and but for the most part she wants to do it because then it helps her integrate the information. APRIL REED: It's the time when I do my notes updates. I write my monthly report at that same time. So it kind of all of it connects for me and kind of helps me put the month together. AUDIENCE MEMBER: So instead of doing it as you go along, you do it at the end of the month. AMINA KRUCK: Yeah, because they send it in at the end of the month. They have that reliability and do you have problems sometimes getting that from people . APRIL REED: You know, occasionally. So sometimes we have to hunt people down and say hey, I know you met with somebody this month can we get that from you or a lot of times it's easy when they come in more mentoring groups and I can catch easy when they come in more mentoring groups and I can catch them before they leave and have them fill out their time sheet. But sometimes that takes a bit of work. AMINA KRUCK: All right. Before you leave, I know it's been a long day. Three or four people high points of the day, please, helps me end my day better to hear what out of all of this today is a high point for you? Yes, you have to use the microphone. Please, go ahead. AUDIENCE MEMBER: Your presentation the co-counseling or your interaction or interaction. AMINA KRUCK: the disability integration part? AMINA KRUCK: That's only one, yes. AUDIENCE MEMBER: I was going to say the same thing so I'll say something else. I was also I think some of the small group discussion and also listening to what some of the other folks have to share. That gives us an opportunity to chat with other folks and get other ideas and share where we're at and so besides hearing your wonderful programs and services and how you've evolved, we can hear from other people and get some great ideas. AMINA KRUCK: Yeah. Resources. I wanted Paula to kind of track what people were talking about because I think that's a great list for going after funding for peer support, that list that we got of all the benefits. Somebody over here? AUDIENCE MEMBER: I was excited about your train the trainer program so can I sign up? AMINA KRUCK: The disability thank you. Talk to the people. Talk them into it. Thank you. One more. Yeah. Thanks. AUDIENCE MEMBER: For me it was reviewing the training manual for the peer mentors and volunteers. As we're going through it, I was making notes and outline of how I want to use other material. AMINA KRUCK: That's meat of it. If you just got the manual and you didn't get all this discussion with it, it wouldn't be as usable. Because those things aren't there just to be there, they all have purposes. I'm glad you really have the chance and you'll have a chance in the morning too when we come back in the morning if you've looked over it a little more, if you have other questions for April in the morning, we'll do that same kind of roundup in the morning and then we'll be working on your action plan because you don't get out of here without one. About what you've been able to take from what's happened here to give yourself steps to move forward. So be thinking about your homework to think about what are the barriers that you're noticing. And/or the intimidations that you're noticing. And what are the strengths that you see that you've got already. And some steps that you're able to report because that's what we're going to work on tomorrow. Thank you, good job, everybody.