CCN provides Psychosocial Rehabilitation
through the Arts programming that utilizes the arts, through professional
and peer-to-peer mentoring, as a way to help young people either
rehabilitate or "habilitate" their social and emotional
responses to the world. There is an implied assumption that there
are deficits in the child’s social/emotional skills or functioning
that we can help "recover" through the use of psychosocial
and artistic interventions. The title suggests a marriage of the
two; traditional mental health therapy with the arts as the vehicle
for the application of these interventions.
Program participants suffer from
emotional disorders that greatly impair their functioning and their
ability to control their behavior. Special consideration is given
to clients that have open cases with the Department of Children
& Family Services (DCFS); those involved in special education,
the probation department and the juvenile justice system, clients
recently released from hospitals or residential placement facilities
and those with a mentally ill parent.
The majority of our program participants live in high-risk, densely
populated areas throughout the city. Pico-Union, Downtown Los Angeles,
the City of Commerce, North Hills (northern San Fernando Valley),
and Palmdale (Antelope Valley) districts and their surrounding communities
now have access to programming that has not existed or previously
been available.
The youth and their families face a myriad of
problems including severe emotional disorders, poverty, immigration
issues, domestic violence, a lack of education and employment opportunities,
language barriers, and substance abuse issues. Due to the inherent
challenges and the need for single parents to spend the majority
of their waking hours working, very little quality time is left
to raise, let alone play with their children. Many of the young
people receive exposure to the arts and related activities for the
first time.
The program is structured as a three-hour group session divided
by age as follows: 6-8, 9-11, 12-13, and 14-17.
| Part one: |
Group Activities/Talking
Circle/Theater Games (30 min.) |
| Part two: |
Group Sharing/Role Playing,
Nutrition (40 min.) |
| Part three: |
Creative Arts: Music, Theater,
Painting &/or Drawing (90 min.) |
| Part four: |
Art Project Discussion/Closing
Circle (20 min.) |
The most common disorders treated include:
