NEW ULM – Representatives from the Family Facilitator program presented an update on their services and progress during a School Board Study Session Thursday.

Clinical Supervisor Jamie Rieser led the discussion regarding Family Facilitator. She said the program started in the mid-90s and seeks to help Brown County students and families from birth to 18 years old.

“They do case management and skills work,” Rieser said. “That could be individual skills work with kids and parenting skills. There’s a piece of helping families create routines that work better for kids, helping facilitate communication with schools and at home.”

Family Facilitator can also help with things outside of school. Rieser said they can connect families with therapists if kids are having mental health issues. It also extends to physical health, such as lining up visits with dentists or eye doctors.

Rieser said in the last year they provided services for 46 families, reaching 76 kids. This includes 28 new cases they’ve opened in that time and 23 cases that’ve been closed.

“We do a pretty good job of equally opening and closing,” Rieser said. “Which is good, because that’s what we need to do to keep caseloads manageable.”

Ideally, the program seeks to operate at around 12 caseloads. Rieser said it currently operates at around 18. Family Facilitator does not have a waitlist, instead taking in cases and filtering some out. Rieser said time spent in the program varies greatly.

“We do have families that we work with for a long time,” she said. “On average it’s around 18 months. We have families that we work with for five years, and we have families [where] we will graduate that kid out of the program and they started when they were seven. Sometimes they come and go in and out of the program.”

Funding for the program fluctuates frequently. Rieser said it comes from the state in two sections, one for child welfare and the other for children’s mental health. The rate for reimbursement funding operates on a formula, which considers how many kids are getting services in a county.

“We can’t control what the state pays,” Rieser said. “We can’t control if families are on Medicare Advantage (MA) or not. If the family’s on private health insurance, we are still going to work with them, but we will get no safe reimbursement [like we do with MA]. A lot of private health insurance families means cost to the district will be a lot higher versus if we have a lot of MA families.

Board member Amanda Groebner asked what happens if students go to a school in Brown County and live in Nicollet or a different surrounding county. Rieser said they cannot use Family Facilitator, but they will be referred to Nicollet County Human Services to see what is available.

For more information, visit https://www.co.brown.mn.us/images/Department/Human_Services/WebsiteFFbrochure2.pdf.