Reply #41: I was a Group Home

[libpunkmom]

Program manager for years. It's not a great system at all. My clients ranged from Downs Syndrome to mentally retarded Paranoid Schizophrenics. I had some clients that were in there 40's-50's and had spent their lives in an institution (two of my clients had been in since there were 5-7 years old) Our jobs were to teach these people to "live in society". Most of my clients were the sweetest people, some were potentially dangerous. The system is very reactive, not proactive. I had a client that really needed some, let's say, sex ed classes. Mainly to prevent him from becoming an offender. The state & county would not provide classes unless this person did commit a crime. (don't know whatever happened to him). Anyway, I quit working in the system 5 years ago, I was transferred to working with some (fairly hardcore) sex offenders. Lots of sex offenders are now put in group homes and halfway houses. I quit because I could no longer in good conscious preform my job duties of upholding, defending and protecting some of my clients rights (people who classify and live in group homes have a few additional rights, which were originally intended to protect the MR/DD population). All I can say, is that from my personal experience with the system there are some people who really do belong in an institutional setting, not only for there on safety, but for the safety of others.