E-News, The CTC Connection: November/December 2018

November/December 2018

Our Vision: Fulfilling the potential of all people with special needs.

The CTC Connection

AN E-NEWSLETTER OF CTC ACADEMY

Our Mission: Enhancing the lives of children and young adults with special needs, and their families, by providing an enriched educational, therapeutic and supportive environment.

Welcome to Our E-Newsetter!

Parent Update from the Executive Director

November 2018

Dear CTC Parents,

I believe the general consensus is that we had the best Halloween celebrations yet at both campuses! If you weren’t able to join us, please check out this great video from the Fair Lawn event and these photos from Oakland. As part of the Sesame Street leadership team, Cookie Monster and others were also in the house:

A number of us have been visiting other agencies to learn about how they operate adult day programs. We are also learning more about the operation of clinics and afterschool programs. It is our intention to make recommendations to our Board of Directors by early next year on whether or not we should make plans to operate these types of programs. We will keep you posted as we move forward.

We met with our preferred contractor to construct our water treatment plant and are now in the process of finalizing our agreement with them. We expect to see them on-site in December to get working on the project. We were pleasantly surprised to hear that the cold weather should not cause any delays (unless we have a snowstorm of course!) and that it is an added plus that the ground is firmer than at other times of year.

At our Fair Lawn campus, we met again with our architect and saw a first draft of drawings for enhancements to the building. We provided initial feedback and he has gone back to the drawing board to make further changes. We will share the plans with you once they are fleshed out a bit more.

I recently attended the annual meeting of one of the organizations CTC Academy is a member of - The Alliance of Private Special Education Schools of North Jersey (the Alliance for short!). I urge you to check out their website and consider attending their annual conference in April . It is free of charge and is geared to supporting families with children with special needs. In addition, if you ever need someone to advocate for you in your dealing with a school district, they have someone there to help .

Finally, you have probably heard about the adenovirus that has hit a number of NJ facilities serving people with disabilities. As of this writing, as a precautionary measure, we hired a company called ServPro and over a couple of weekends this month, we had them do a deep clean and “fogging” of every room at both campuses. This is in addition to our daily cleaning and use of universal precautions to assure the safety of all our precious CTC students.

As always, you can contact me anytime by phone at either campus number (201-797-7440 ext 3258 or 201-612-5677 ext 2111) or by email at kberger@ctcacademy.org .

Happy Holidays!

Ken Berger, Executive Director

Mark Your Calendars

December 1: SibShops Program: Open Enrollment: See Social Work Department below for more information!

December 1: Meditation @ Sacred Space Living (parents only) Click HERE for more information!

December 4: Dinner Dance Committee Meeting 9:30am (@FL)

December 4: Education Series 7:00pm - 9:00pm (@FL)

Click HERE for more information!

December 5: Warren Point Orchestra Holiday Performance (@FL)

December 13: Elks Luncheon (@OAK)

December 18: Holiday Show 10:00am & 1:00pm (@OAK)

December 18: Mom's Time Out - Holiday Baking with Ashley 7:00pm - 9:00pm (@OAK)

December 19: Holiday Show 10:30am (@FL)

December 21: Early Student Dismissal (12:45pm @OAK & 1:00pm @FL)

December 24 - January 1: School Closed (@FL & OAK)

January 2: School Re-opens (@FL & OAK)

CTC Academy's 2018-19 School Year Calendar is available HERE

Visit Our School Monthly Activity Calendar

HEALTH DEPARTMENT

Note to CTC parents: I f you have changes to your contact number, e-mail address or any change to personal information for you or your child, please contact the health office.

Click HERE to learn more about Hand-Washing Advice from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.

THE SOCIAL WORK DEPARTMENT

SIBSHOPS PROGRAM

Sibshops provide support and guidance to siblings of children with special needs in a fun and interactive setting – games, creative projects and even cooking!

Open Enrollment - Click HERE for more information!

PLANNING FOR ADULT LIFE

Click HERE for more information!

MANAGING STRESS DURING THE HOLIDAYS

Click HERE for more information!

Click HERE for the Social Work Calendar of Events!

Attention CTC Parents, we are so proud of the Learn Together Program which brings typical kids from our community into the classroom so that they can learn and play with our students! It is an incredible opportunity for all of the children. Will you please help us identify kids that may benefit from this experience? Please spread the word that we are looking for children ages for this free program…and click HERE for more info…

ABLE ACT

ACI Consumers should be aware of The Achieving A Better Life Expectancy Act, or more commonly known as The ABLE Act . ABLE allows people with disabilities to save money in a special a "disability savings account" without the risk of losing much needed federal and public benefits, such as SSI, Medicaid, SNAP, etc. To date, 9 states are considered to be "active" and ready for enrollment; while the rest have "programs in development." The good news is that you can live in any part of the country and open up an ABLE account in any state.

For more information on how to obtain an ABLE Account, contact ACI or check out ABLE's national website at ablenrc.org .

Follow Link for more information: http://www.njcaregivers.org/fscarchive/content/services/training-calendar/view_event.php?event=4400