Greetings from ICCD's Executive Director
Dear Clubhouse Colleagues and Friends,
We are delighted to share our latest edition of the ICCD Newsletter with you!
In the face of the daily barrage of often bleak news from all around the world, the international Clubhouse community continues to dig deep and to redouble our shared commitment to change the world for people living with mental illness.
In this issue of our Newsletter, you will learn more about our ambitious plan to scale up the operations of the ICCD over the course of the next five years. Our strategic plan positions us to be able to do more to ensure the strength and sustainability of existing Clubhouses, and to help nurture new Clubhouse development in places where people living with mental illness do not yet have access to the opportunities for hope, life, work, and friendship that Clubhouses provide.
Enjoy this Newsletter edition’s article about the newest Clubhouses to join our international family of ICCD Clubhouses, who shared their stories in a wonderful plenary session at the 16th International Seminar in Stockholm Sweden this July. These are inspiring stories of courage, optimism, hope, and commitment to our Clubhouse values and way of working.
An important aspect of our vision is for the ICCD to strengthen its work as an international organization, expanding our operations across the globe. In this Newsletter, you can read about our most recent ICCD Faculty Training, held in Helsinki Finland, which brings a talented, energetic, and experienced new group of European Clubhouse members and staff onto our Faculty accrediting body.
The entire ICCD Faculty met for its annual meeting, after the Seminar in Stockholm. The article in this Newsletter describes one of the important projects that was on the agenda at this Faculty meeting, which is the review and revision of the ICCD Employment Guidelines for accreditation. We will continue to keep the Clubhouse community informed and updated about this important review.
At the ICCD we understand that now, more than ever, is not the time to give up: it is the time for us all to step up. The work we are doing is too important for us to waver in the face of these uncertain times. As a Clubhouse community we need to remember our shared history: WANA, a group of vulnerable newly discharged patients from a state psychiatric hospital, who joined together and created the foundation of what is now a worldwide force that has, and will continue to, change the world.
Enjoy the Newsletter! We welcome your thoughts, comments and feedback!
Sincerely,
Joel Corcoran
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Employment Guidelines Committee
ICCD Employment Committee: Tasked with Comprehensive
Review of ICCD Employment Guidelines
The ICCD Employment Committee was originally formed in 1997 as a sub-committee of the Faculty for Clubhouse Development. The Committee was charged with establishing guidelines for the Faculty, for consistent assessment of Clubhouses’ employment programs for the purposes of ICCD accreditation. Over the years the Employment Committee has made revisions to that document, and added language that would make the Guidelines flexible enough to meet the needs of worldwide Clubhouse community.
However, in response to the recent global economic downturn and expressed concerns from many in the international Clubhouse community, the ICCD Faculty has decided that a more thorough exploration of the Guidelines would be helpful. A new ICCD Employment Committee was established, charged with engaging in a comprehensive review of the worldwide ICCD Clubhouse employment situation, and with making any consequent revisions of the ICCD Employment Guidelines.
The new Employment Committee was established at the December 2010 annual meeting of the ICCD Faculty, and is co-chaired by Criss Habal-Brosek of Progress Place, Canada; and Ruth Osterman of Genesis Club, Massachusetts. The other committee members are:
Charly Kahl-Gortan, Clubhaus Munchen Giesing, Germany
Sinikka Kurri, Imatran Klubitalo, Finland
Jak Dennison, Pioneer Clubhouse, Australia
Kasia Boguszewska, Warszawski Dom pod Fontanna, Poland
Robby Vorspan, ICCD, New York
Mark Maragnano, Charles Webster Potter Place, Massachusetts
Annette Callow, Scotia Clubhouse, Scotland
The Committee began its work by creating an ICCD Employment Survey that was sent out to Clubhouses throughout the world. The Survey was developed as a vehicle through which every Clubhouse could be heard, and could offer its opinions and ideas about the Employment Guidelines, and the goals and challenges of Clubhouse employment programs.
116 surveys were completed and submitted, and the Employment Committee spent several months reviewing and analyzing the rich data in these responses. The Committee then summarized its analysis of the surveys, and developed a set of recommendations based on the feedback from the international Clubhouse community. This set of recommendations was then presented to the ICCD Faculty at its July 2011 Annual Meeting, in Stockholm, Sweden.
Based on the Survey responses, it is clear that the international Clubhouse community continues to highly value and prioritize the need to provide a broad range of employment opportunities to its members; and that Transitional Employment remains a core value and practice throughout the Clubhouse world. The survey analysis also indicated that there are ways in which the ICCD must revise the Employment Guidelines in order to ensure that they remain ‘ambitious yet achievable’ for the entire worldwide Clubhouse community.
The Committee has received extensive feedback from the Faculty on its preliminary recommendations. The next step in the process will be for the Employment Committee to draft a revised Employment Guidelines document, and distribute it for review to the full ICCD Faculty for comment and feedback. The Faculty plans to disseminate the new Employment Guidelines early in 2012.
In response to responses on the Survey, the Employment Guidelines will be thoroughly reviewed every two years from now forward to ensure that they continue to reflect ‘ambitious but achievable’ employment goals for Clubhouses.
ICCD FACULTY TRAINING IN HELSINKI, FINLAND
The ICCD held a Faculty Training in at Helsingin Klubitalo, Helsinki, Finland, from April 4-8, 2011. As the ICCD Clubhouse movement continues to spread around the world, the ICCD has identified the need to expand the Faculty for Clubhouse Development (the ICCD working group responsible for accreditation visits). In particular, we have prioritized the need to increase the number of Faculty from European Clubhouses.
The ICCD offers its intensive Faculty Training session once each year, usually training between eight and sixteen new Faculty members in each training session. The April training in Helsinki included nine trainees, eight of whom are from European Clubhouses. They are:
Pauli Löija, Helsingin Klubitalo, Finland
Annlaug Nielsen, Fontenehuset Honefoss, Norway
Jukka Pousi, Imatran Klubitalo, Finland
Leena Niemi, Imatran Klubitalo, Finland
Jon Sigurgeirsson, Klúburrin Geysir, Iceland
Kåre Grüner, Fontenehuset i Oslo, Norway
Kjartan Emil Sigurdsson, Klúburrin Geysir, Iceland
Knut Stubben, Fontenehuset Honefoss, Norway
Tiffany Adamson, Crossroads Clubhouse, USA
The ICCD Faculty Training is an intensive, comprehensive hands-on training that includes a ‘mock’ accreditation visit to a local Clubhouse. Although the training is demanding, we have consistently heard that is extremely effective in preparing the Clubhouse members and staff undergoing the training to do high quality accreditation visits.
We are delighted to welcome our newest Faculty members and we thank them in advance for their hard work and their invaluable service to the international Clubhouse community!
Thank you to Helsingin Klubitalo and other participating Finnish Clubhouse for being such wonderful hosts!
Raising Our ICCD Voices: Raising Public Awareness
“Look at all these people watching us from their balconies and all the restaurants and stores. This Parade really helps us to bring mental health issues to the doorstep of society”, as spoken by one of over 1,000 participants in an anti-stigma parade at the 16th International Clubhouse Seminar July 9-14 in Stockholm, Sweden.
Click image below to view a video clip of the parade
As part of the ICCD Strategic plan, we are looking at more ways that the ICCD and over 330 ICCD Clubhouses in 30 countries can more effectively communicate the important issues related to mental illness and how ICCD Clubhouses can and should be part of the solution.
The Parade in Sweden, organized by Fountain House Stockholm, was one recent example of raising more public awareness about mental health issues. Several other recent and upcoming events include:
16IS Celebrated New Clubhouses Around the World!
The 16th International Clubhouse Seminar was held in Stockholm, Sweden, July 9 – 14, 2001. Approximately 400 people - Clubhouse members, staff, Board and Advisory Board members, and other friends of Clubhouses - gathered for our great biennial celebration of Clubhouse work.
Every ICCD International Seminar showcases a group of start-up Clubhouses in one of the opening Seminar plenary sessions. This year, our panel of new Clubhouse communities consisted of Pelaren Clubhouse, Finland; Donald Berman UP House, Quebec, Canada; HOPE Clubhouse of Southwest Florida, USA; SEVAC Clubhouse, Kolkata, India, and the Gibraltar Clubhouse Project, Gibraltar.
We welcome our newest generation of Clubhouse communities to the worldwide federation of Clubhouses!
The following are excerpts from their 16IS plenary presentations:
Pelaren Clubhouse, Åland, Finland (presented by Stefan Malmberg, Elisabet Ejvald, Kristina Eriksson)
The first year has passed by in a hurry. There have been ups and downs and not two days are the same. We've been close-knitted very tightly, and the joy and care that we feel for each other is visible.
The support from all parts of the community has been huge. Still, one of the most important things that helped us to where we are, is that members were helping out with the house even before it started, and that many things have just sorted out by themselves. Sometimes we just find ourselves saying: “Oops, we did it!!”
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Donald Berman Up House, Quebec, Canada (presented by Philip Silverberg and Ruth McLellan)
Two years ago, our working group was motivated because we knew we were not introducing a new type of psychosocial environment to the Montreal social service continuum, but rather we were implementing an established ICCD model that had proven, worldwide acceptance and outcomes. By leveraging this collective Clubhouse experience, seed money was generously and confidently donated.
The excitement of opening Canada’s first bi-lingual Clubhouse inspired Justin Trudeau, Member of Parliament and the son of former Prime Minister Pierre-Eliot Trudeau, to give the keynote speech at our Official Opening ceremony. Also in attendance were Louise Bradley, CEO of the Mental Health Commission of Canada, Marc Garneau, Canada’s first astronaut, and many other government officials.
For sure, in our first year, we have made an impact.
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Hope House of Southwest Florida, Fort Myers, Florida (presented by Debra Webb and Joyce Miller)
One of our key developments was participating in the ICCD New Clubhouse Development Training program. The working group participated in this training in 2007 and it really laid the foundation for us to get a road map of where we wanted to go and how to get there. We felt like we now had in our hands a goal plan which served as a major building block towards establishing HOPE Clubhouse.
Essential to our success has been our very strong and passionate leadership, committed to educating the community about the need of a Clubhouse and the ability to fundraise to meet those needs. The Board of Directors has been a working board that also donates funds to the Clubhouse. We are fortunate to have Judith Gartner and Bill Maddeus who are both ICCD board members as well.
If I had to provide a recipe for establishing a successful Clubhouse, it would have the following ingredients: a passionate board and Executive Director, determined leadership, courage to stand up for stomping out the stigma of mental illness, and courage to ask for funding.
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SEVAC Clubhouse, Kolkata, India (presented by Dr. Prativa Sengupta)
In India the training in Psychiatry is evidently of global standard. But the paradox is this: due to the inadequacy of the state run mental health care delivery system a large number of mentally ill patients don’t have any access to psychiatric care and live a deplorable life. Some of these ailing folks are also abandoned by their family members and wander around the streets in a subhuman state. A good many of these patients either languish in religious places for faith healing or are simply dumped in some custodial institutions. This is the pitiable grey area of the mental health scenario in our country.
The primary challenges we faced were to build SEVAC’s infrastructure, and to develop the skill of our team to run a Clubhouse in its proper spirit. Hence we put emphasis on infrastructure development, and we went to Colleague Training at Fountain House, New York. SEVAC Clubhouse is a membership organization of persons who suffered from serious mental illness, and now are in a stable or moderately stable condition. The Clubhouse activities aim at helping its members to regain self-confidence, emerge as productive individuals, and reintegrate into mainstream society.
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Gibraltar Clubhouse Project, Gibraltar (presented by Emily Adamberry Olivero)
In June 2010 I faced my biggest challenge. I gave a Clubhouse presentation to the majority of the Mental Health Care Professionals in Gibraltar including two Government Ministers, Clinical Psychiatrists, the Community Mental Health Team, the Occupational therapists team, the Clinical Standards Compliance Director, Social workers etc. I knew that if I did not have their approval of the Clubhouse model there was no point in ‘banging my head against a brick wall.’ And comments from the audience were very positive, and the response was very cooperative. The Clubhouse model was welcomed with open arms and the presentation got a standing ovation, initiated by the Minister for Social Affairs, who urged me to keep working to create a Clubhouse in Gibraltar!
Focus on the ICCD Board: Updates
ICCD Remembers Three "FireSouls"
The international Clubhouse community remembers and honors the lives of Rudyard n. Propst, Anse Leroy and Jim Schmidt. These three "fire souls" will be missed. With respect and sadness, we wish them farewell.
Rudyard n. Propst, the founder and first Executive Director of the ICCD, died on June 16, 2011. As an international Clubhouse community, we mourn the loss of the man who fanned the Fountain House flame into a worldwide
movement, and we celebrate his life...Read More
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Anse Leroy, M.D. Unfortunately, we have lost Anse Leroy. After four months in hospital, she died on Saturday, April 30th 2011. Anse was a fiercely dedicated advocate for the Clubhouse model, both in theory and in practice...
Read More
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Jim Schmidt, James R. "Jim" Schmidt, who worked for 38 years at the Fountain House in New York City and served as its Executive Director 1982 to 1992, died August 11, 2011, of pancreatic cancer. Jim was born in 1927 in Queens.
After retiring from Fountain House, Jim moved to Maine with his wife, Mollie. Despite having ‘retired,’ Jim continued to work tirelessly to develop and support the development of Clubhouses in Maine. His work has made an immense impact...Read More
