2018 Conference for
Grandparents Raising Grandchildren
The 2018 Conference for Grandparents Raising Grandchildren was held June 6, 2018 at the Best Western Royal Plaza Hotel in Marlboro. Almost 200 grandparents and providers spent the day listening and learning from each other and were engaged in meaningful, solution-focused dialogue on issues important to grandparents and relative caregivers. The Commission would again like to recognize recipients
Joe O’Leary
(the 2018 Harriet Jackson-Lyons Award) and
Deanna Forist
(the 2018 John Lepper Advocacy Award) for their support, commitment, and passion for helping all grandparents raising grandchildren throughout the Commonwealth and in their own communities. We would also like to thank First Lady Lauren Baker for helping us present these awards as well at the Governor’s Citations for their work in this area. Conference participants were moved by Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan’s Keynote Address which focused on the devastating effects of the opioid crisis on children and families and some of the innovative and creative programs to help families impacted by this epidemic.
For the 2018 conference, attendees once again participated in the World Café Activity. This year, however, attendees broke up into regions in order to discuss what services and resources worked well in their community, which services and resources were lacking or not working well in their community, and finally, what suggestions could they make to improve services and resources within their community as well as statewide. Feedback from the Regional World Café was overwhelmingly positive with one grandparent commenting “I was so happy to meet other grandparents from my area and to leave the conference with information about exactly where to go for some help.”
In order to read the summary for your region, click on the links below.
For a summary of the 2018 Conference, please click on the link:
