State Home Visiting Expansion
State Home Visiting Expansion
Michigan Early Childhood Home Visiting Tribal Expansion
The Michigan Early Childhood Home Visiting Tribal Expansion program’s purpose is to support the provision of evidence-based home visiting services within tribal communities in Michigan, and thereby expanding the reach of Tribal home visiting within the state. This program is funded through a grant supported by the State of Michigan’s general funds and seeks to address persistent disparities in maternal, infant, and early childhood health and social indicators among the American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) population through delivery of home visiting services. The project aims to expand the capacity of an existing network of services, furthering progress toward a comprehensive, high-quality early childhood system.
State Home Visiting Expansion services are supported within the following tribal communities and serve expectant families with young children aged birth to 5 years old.
Participating Tribes
- Little River Band of Odawa Indians
- Pokagon Band of Potawatomi
- Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians
Program Goals
The goals of the State Home Visiting Expansion Program include:
- Supporting the development of happy, healthy, and successful American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) Children and families through a coordinated home visiting strategy that addresses critical maternal and child health, development, early learning, family support, and child abuse and neglect prevention needs.
- Implementing high-quality, culturally-relevant, evidence-based home visiting programs in AI/AN communities.
- Expanding the evidence base around home visiting interventions with Native populations.
- Supporting and strengthening cooperation and coordination and promoting linkages among various early childhood programs, resulting in coordinated, comprehensive early childhood systems.
Coordinated Services
Collaboration is important to our programs at Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan. Within the Maternal & Early Childhood Services Department this can be seen specifically between our Tribal Home Visiting, Healthy Start, and State Funded Home Visiting Programs. These programs have joined forces as individual pieces of an overall, inter-tribal network of home visiting programs and services coordinated by the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan in partnership with Michigan tribes. The programs to the communities appear as one, and are often referred to by staff as the “Healthy Start-Family Spirit” Home Visiting program. The development of the Healthy Start-Family Spirit Home Visiting program is one key aspect of our comprehensive, coordinated early childhood system with all programs using the Family Spirit Model as a basis for providing home visitation services. In addition, the programs share client-friendly referral procedures, using common assessments, collection of common data elements, cross-training of staff, and cross-program case management. This allows for a seamless transition between programs for home visiting clients.
Contact Information
- Amanda Bahrou | amanda@itcmi.org | Program Director
- Amanda Rinna | amanda.rinna@itcmi.org | Program Coordinator