Happy New Year, Forge and KPC! What a year it's been. We are so proud of the work everyone has accomplished this year and of everyone's individual and collective successes. It can be easy to get swept up in the day to day details, but we encourage you to take a moment and reflect on the impact you all have made on so many lives. We truly couldn't be prouder to be part of this team and to work towards our mission to provide effective, affordable, and accessible mental health and substance use care to all in need, together.

With that, we want to go into this holiday weekend and new year extending the utmost gratitude for everyone's hard work this year. We hope everyone has an amazing end to 2022 filled with love, health, and joy!

This month's newsletter has some important HR reminders, including the implementation of our brand new Wellness Reimbursement Program, as well as lots of fun holiday outings/pictures. Before we dive in, we wanted to extend a quick shoutout to KPC - this last month, they celebrated year 7 of administering Vivitrol - a special thank you to Chris Cox for flagging!

Kristin Hoats

Clinician

Greensburg, PA

Dave Karpf

Senior Business Operations Analyst

Corporate

Holly Livingston

Director of Business Development

Pennsylvania

Angela Molnar

Clinician

Toms River, NJ

Alexandra Pensado Sendon

Clinician

West Orange, NJ

Gisette Rodriguez

Administrative Assistant

Virtual Outpatient, NJ

Holly Selepouchin

Clinician

Virtual Outpatient, NJ

Ashley Sheridan

Director, Content Marketing

Corporate

Work Anniversaries

Elsa Pfeifer

Program Supervisor, KPC Hauppauge

Her 12 year Anniversary is Jan. 3rd!

Lori Appelbaum

Psych NP, Paramus, NJ

Her 2 year Anniversary is Jan. 4th!

Olivia Coffman Administrative Assistant, Greensburg, PA

Her 2 year Anniversary is Jan.7th!

Michael McCann

Executive Director, New Jersey

His 2 year Anniversary is Jan. 18th!

Kathryn Boyd

Office Manager, Greensburg, PA

Her 3 year Anniversary is Jan. 20th!

Genie Manganas

Clinician, KPC Hauppauge

Her 18 year Anniversary is Jan. 24th!

🎉Celebrating our January staff birthdays!🎉

Happy Birthday!

Alexandra Pensado Sendon - January 1st

Samantha Santo - January 6th

Jessica Janus - January 7th

Angela Molnar - January 10th

Susan Wolf - January 14th

Susan Tuffini - January 20th

Ken Nicholson - January 21st

Christine Zogaib - January 27th

David Oppmann - January 27th



Susan Reyna

This month we are highlighting Susan Reyna, one of our fantastic Paramus clinicians. Susan joined Forge in October 2021 with her LSW and we are thrilled to announce that this last month, Susan not only received her LCSW but also became EMDR certified. These are two incredible accomplishments that require an immense amount of time and dedication. We are so excited to recoginze you, Susan, and are so proud to have you on the team. Keep shining!

Julie Berger & Jamila Pough

We're closing out 2022 with three employee highlights! I wanted to take a moment to recognize my two incredible teammates, Julie Berger and Jamila Pough. Our organization has been growing rapidly and we couldn't do it without the two of you. From working with our clinical and corporate teams to continue to find passionate, empathetic, and committed staff, to ensuring each new employee has an exceptional onboarding experience, you two work tirelessly to move mountains all while keeping Forge's mission as your north star through the work that you do. Thank you both for everything!

Brian Kephart

Executive Director, Western Pennsylvania

We are tremendously excited to announce that Brian Kephart has been promoted to Executive Director of Western Pennsylvania! Brian joined Forge in 2017 as one of our inaugural Executive Clinical Directors and has been overseeing the Greensburg facility for the last five years. Brian has been instrumental in building Forge's clinical programming from the ground up and does so with grace, compassion, and a keen ability to always see the bigger picture. In Brian's new role, he will be overseeing a team of Executive Clinical Directors in Western Pennsylvania and continuing to help us execute our growth in that region. Congratulations, Brian! We are so excited for you to take on this new role and for your continued growth and success with Forge.

Please join us in congratulating Brian in his new role!

IOP Gingerbread Houses

The evening IOP group in Greensburg hosted a holiday party with their clients where they allowed members of group sessions to partake in sober and communal activities, including making gingerbread houses, leading up to the holiday season. What a creative and enjoyable way to celebrate this time with our clients. Great work, Greensburg team!

🍪Client Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe 🍪

One of our West Orange clients emailed Lisa Spiegel, Office Manager, their chocolate chip cookie recipe to share! This not only gave us an amazing new dessert to try, but showed us how comfortable the client is with their Forge team and how they see Forge as an impactful part of their life. Really amazing! We wanted to share with you all for a holiday treat:

Ingredients

• 1 cup of unsalted butter-room temperature
• 1 cup of brown sugar (light or dark) packed
• 1 cup of white sugar
• 2 eggs at room temperature
• 1 tsp of baking soda (make sure that it’s the room deodorizer)
• 1 tsp of baking powder
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp of salt
• 2 cups of all purpose flour
• 21/2 cups of Whole Grain Oatmeal
• 1 1/2- cups of pecans, walnuts or no nuts
• 12 ounces of Nestle’s Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips or Giardelli semi sweet chocolate chips.
• 1- 4 or 8 oz Hershey chocolate bar or Giardelli-crushed

Directions

• Blend the eggs and vanilla extract first in the mixer
• Add the white and brown sugar, stop the mixer and scrape, to make sure that all of the ingredients are well blended.
• Add the baking powder and baking soda
• Add chocolate chips and crushed Hershey bar
• Add the flour
• You can either pulverize or leave the oatmeal whole depending on the consistency you want
• Add the oatmeal slowly
• Scoop batter into a round tsp and roll into a ball
• Spread the cookies on cookie sheet
• Bake cookies for 13 minutes

Enjoy! Thanks for sharing, Lisa!

The White Plains clinical team had a fantastic team outing this month! They started the day at Town & Village of Harrison's Department of Community Service, where the team used their VTO day to volunteer at the food pantry and help with holiday gifting for children. After their VTO day, they had a team lunch together and wrapped the day with a paint night at Muse in White Plains. Check out pictures below.

The West Orange clinical team hosted a holiday potluck dinner at the office! They adorned their festive holiday outfits. Check out a few pictures below.

See below for pictures of the Greensburg team rocking their ugly Christmas sweaters during their holiday party at the Italian restaurant, Olives and Peppers!

The White Plains corporate team got together for a holiday dinner at Sapori of White Plains! Benji and John came with their game faces on in their matching maroon sweaters, pictured below.

Our fantastic Care Coordination team (Danielle Heneson, Cynthia Fox, and Hannah Blank) out for a holiday brunch in New Jersey!

Liz Walker hosted the first in person annual Forge/KPC & INTER-CARE luncheon since pre-covid! The event took place in downtown Manhattan and was a massive success. Pictured below are Rachel Rodriguez and Andres Reyes-Capo alongside Liz. The massive smiles may or may not be due in part to the delicious BBQ that was served.

KPC Holiday Party

Our fantastic KPC Syosset and Hauppauge staff, as well as the honorary KPC staff member Daniel Lenzo & Liz Walker, at their annual holiday party! Check out pictures below.

Manchester Holiday Party

Our Manchester team had a holiday party with Secret Santa included! A few pictures below, including the Manchester pups, a staple of our NH team.

Paramus Holiday Party

Our Paramus team was having too much fun celebrating together and walked out with zero pictures. On a totally unrelated note, I'm looking for volunteers to be the stage parent in Paramus.

Wellness Reimbursement Program – Effective January 1, 2023, Forge and KPC are thrilled to implement our new Wellness Reimbursement Program. Every full-time Forge Health and KPC employee will receive an annual reimbursement of up to $150 for anything you deem to benefit your physical and/or mental well-being, within the parameters of the policy located here and in the HR corner on the Intranet. Think gym memberships, running shoes, yoga mats, you name it!

Two Mental Health/Personal Wellness days will be added to the Forge Health PTO package starting 2023! All full-time employees are eligible. These two additional days will not be eligible for rollover, and will be a separate bank located within Gusto.

A reminder to please send your flu attestation or declination form to Alicia McDermott as soon as possible. Today is the last day to submit your form in order to be entered to win one of three Amazon gift cards!

Don't forget - Forge Health and KPC are closed on Monday, January 2nd for New Years Day. Forge Health is closed on Monday, January 16th for Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Welcome back to the recurring Monthly Tech Tip section! Can’t hear your computer? Nobody can hear you? Oh no! Let’s fix some common audio issues. In this month’s tech tip, we will talk about ways to troubleshoot when:

1. Your computer has no sound or you cannot hear some programs
2. Your microphone is not working and nobody can hear you on Teams or Zoom

When your computer has no sound:

• First, follow the standard troubleshooting steps making sure you don't have headphones plugged in (or connected via Bluetooth) that you are not using, and make sure your system volume is turned up or unmuted. Use the keyboard key for 'Volume Up' to make sure.
• If you still have no sound, check if your computer is using the correct output: the laptop’s speakers. Click the speaker icon (see blue arrow below) and make sure the audio input (see red arrow below) is set to 'speakers'.

• If you still have no sound, the next step is to run all Windows updates (see last month’s tech tip) and give your machine a reboot. After reboot, if sound is still not coming from your computer, open a ticket with support by sending us an email at [email protected]

When your microphone isn't working:

• First, make sure your computer’s microphone is set as the active device and determine if you have another microphone attached to your computer. Common alternate microphones can come from a connected webcam or a connected Bluetooth headset. This is found in the sound settings (right click the blue arrow, then left click the red arrow). Make sure your computer has 'Microphone Array' selected as your input!

• If It’s still not working, confirm your chat program is also using the same default microphone. 
• For Teams, select Menu, Settings, Devices, and make sure your microphone is set to 'Microphone Array'.
• For Zoom, when in a meeting, click the small upward arrow next to your microphone symbol (see blue arrow below) and make sure 'Microphone Array' is chosen.

• After following these steps, if you still are not able to transmit your voice to the microphone, run all Windows updates (see last month’s tech tip) and give your computer a reboot. If this does not help, open a ticket with support by emailing us at [email protected]
• We know how important your telehealth technology is and we are dedicated to keeping you connected at all times! Happy New Year Everyone!  - Mike Cohen

Please remember, and a fresh reminder for our new staff, if you'd like to see your highlights, celebrations, wins, events, pictures of your pet, etc., included in next month's newsletter, please send your submissions to Rachel Rodriguez at [email protected].

With that, we wish you all a happy, healthy, and safe New Year! We look forward to all that's to come here at Forge and, well, someone's got to say it - see you next year!

Until then,

Rachel