"Parents Place" in Sderot
Putting the parents in focus
Parents' place in Sderot was built with the vision to strengthen the capacity of parents living under continuous threat of missiles attacks. The center in Sderot is based on the model of Parents' Place developed and supported by Jewish Family and Children Services in San Francisco, and aims to provide services for parents coping with the challenges of raising children in times rapidly alternating between normal routine and emergency states.
Background
The Israel Center for the Treatment of Psychotrauma (ICTP) has been providing various interventions for parents, children, and educational staff in Sderot and its' surrounding areas since 2004. Through the experience gathered by implementing the different interventions, and better familiarity (attunement) with the local needs, the ICTP staff realized that in order to provide young children in these areas with the best care we needed to address their parents' needs. Collaborating with parenting professionals in Israel, the ICTP staff developed unique programs focused on providing parents with knowledge and practical tools of coping with stressful and traumatic experiences as parents of young children.
Through the "parents place" program five different modules of intervention with parents, children and educational staff have been developed:
- A parent-child playgroup program in collaboration with Dr. Esther Cohen of the Hebrew University.
- A training program for educational staff based on a program by Prof. Pnina Klein of the Bar Ilan University.
- A parental therapy group in collaboration with the local psychological services at Sha'ar Hanegev, utilizing their local experience and therapists.
- Bi-weekly questions & answers sessions with the local project coordinator for parents and staff, addressing personal issues and questions regarding parenting issues.
- Monthly lectures provided by professionals and experts, discussing issues of parenting and child development, which are open to the general public.
ICTP team
- Ruth Pat-Horenczyk, Ph.D., Project director
- Michal Achituv, M.A., Clinical coordinator and evaluation
- Dafna Ba- Gad, M.A., Resilience and community coordinator
- Dafna Shamir, M.A., Local coordinator
- Alon Weltman, B.A., Logistical manager
- Consultant: Dr. Esther Cohen, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Funding sources
This wide scale project has been possible thanks to the joint funding of three different organizations. We are grateful for their generosity
The Laszlo N. Tauber Foundation of San Francisco
The estate of the late Pearl K. Schwartz and The UJA-Federation of New York
The Israel Trauma Coalition
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