Good Morning!
Due to our DIA trip on Friday, I wasn’t able to get the blog up before we left for the weekend. Thank you for returning the forms that were sent home, it is so important for us to know what needs to be in place before a student leaves our program. However, in looking at the returned forms, I see a lot of families have checked that they are the students guardian. On this form, we are asking whether the student is his/her own guardian, or if you are their legal guardian, which means you have gone to court and removed the decision making rights that were once your son/daughters. In court, you have to declare and prove that your son/daughter is incapacitated to make decisions on his/her own. On the other hand, Power of Attorney gives you the decision making rights for certain aspects of your son/daughters life, such as financial or medical decisions. If you have indicated that you are the student’s guardian, we will need to place a copy of the legal documents in their file. Please send them to school by Friday, September 30th. If you do not have legal documents, the student is his/her own guardian and we will treat them as such. We will be announcing several workshops throughout the year that will provide more information about Guardianship, Power of Attorney, CMH, etc. I highly recommend attending if possible.
In other news, we are anticipating starting our job sites and CBI next week. It’s time to re-activate any Planet Fitness memberships that were closed for the summer, get your gym bags ready (list of supplies were sent home) find the library cards, and make sure your son/daughter has either a wallet or purse to keep money and membership cards in. Also, please note….work site dress code will be in effect beginning next week. Long pants, close toed shoes, clean shirt. Students who are not scheduled for a job site may continue to wear shorts and sandals. Those who wish to bring shorts to change in to after a job site are welcome to do so.
I am sad to announce that due to a new federal mandate, students under 24 are no longer able to work at STEP, therefore we will no longer be able to attend as a school group. However, if you feel that your son/daughter would like to work there after leaving Dearborn Public Schools, we can help you with that process. It was a great place to work and provided a wonderful experience for our students. I still highly recommend this provider for our students. They provide a full range of services, the workshop was only one tiny part of what they do. They offer vocational training, job placement, job coaching, classes, they have a thrift store that they own and operate, etc. There are many options! Hopefully in the future we can go back, but for now, we have to say goodbye.
That’s it for now! Have a good week!