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A Message from the President & CEO: January 2023

By Ann Marie Ronsman, President & CEO | CASA Child Advocates of Montgomery County

Ann Marie Ronsman

Happy New Year! I hope you had a wonderful holiday and got to spend time making memories with those you love. Thank you for continuing your advocacy work during the busy season. Our Advocates visited children, located family members, delivered gifts, attended court hearing and trials, and even facilitated a few goodbye visits. Child welfare feels especially heavy during the holidays. Thank you for the time, expertise, and emotional energy you invested in children and families this holiday season.

Meeting the need for trauma-informed care

2023 will bring continued opportunities for growth at CASA. We are expanding our TBRI community training this year. We know that of the children who experience trauma, only a small number of children will be removed from their homes. Our goal is to create a trauma-informed Montgomery County where all professionals, including teachers, law enforcement, CPS, courts, and medical providers, can recognize trauma and provide a trauma-informed response to children in need. If you know of a community group that would like TBRI training, please let us know!

connecting our Teens

We will also continue our work with teens. We’re helping to build a bridge for children aging out of foster care to our community partner Angel Reach, which serves youth between the ages of 16 and 24. We also are working on a program where Advocates can become “certified teen Advocates.” These Advocates will have specialized training that will give them expertise in serving this age group.

CASA will continue to offer space at our house to host parent-child visits, with CPS supervision. The garden and sensory path provide a great place for visits that are much more relaxed than in the CPS office. We also will continue to offer TBRI coaching to all families.

empowering our advocates

Our fall Advocate conference will return this year! We haven’t set a date yet; most likely, it will be on a Saturday in September or October 2023. Before Covid, this was an annual event, and we’re all looking forward to resuming this event. You are the heart of CASA, and the work you do changes the trajectory of the lives of our families. Thank you for your dedication to the children of Montgomery County.

Ann Marie Ronsman, MSN, RN, TBRI Practitioner

President & CEO


EVERY CHILD DESERVES A CHANCE…IT’S YOU!

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