Changing systems through youth and family leadership - vaya health, a regional governmental entity and public managed care organization is applying to fund the "changing systems through youth and…

Changing systems through youth and family leadership - vaya health, a regional governmental entity and public managed care organization is applying to fund the "changing systems through youth and family leadership" (csyfl) project. We are applying to address specific needs related to comprehensive community mental health services (ccmhs) through strengthening the system of care (SOC) approach in six rural north carolina (NC) counties. Building a better system for all children with SED is the priority with emphasis on target populations that include (1) minority populations: two counties have high concentrations of african american citizens and two others have above average hispanic/latino citizens; (2) youth exposed to trauma and neglect; (3) youth with or at risk of CO-occurring substance use disorders (SUD); (4) youth with suicide and self-harm attempts; and (5) youth in transition, e.g., from foster care, juvenile justice, or high school, age 16-21. We will hire, train, and embed youth partners (YP) to work with existing teams of family partners (FSP) and SOC coordinators (socc) as new TRI-care teams for each county. We will recruit and serve at least 1,240 youth with a range of 190-370 per year, screened and served with clinical services and ebps. Our primary goal is to build youth and family voice and increase the number of positive childhood experiences (PCE) while fostering resilient communities. Healthy outcomes from positive experiences (hope), resources for resilience (RR), the engaging youth to improve substance misuse prevention model, collective impact and results-based accountability will be blended in an intentional approach that will include sustainability planning from day one. Youth in need will have access to the full array of services including enhanced services (e.g., high fidelity wraparound or multisystemic therapy), and will remain in the csyfl for TRI-care support no matter where they are served. System of care child collaboratives in each county will be supported to expand system change capacity. Youth and family led support groups will be supported or expanded in each county and an annual youth led conference established. We will prioritize youth and family voice identified problems and through youth-led groups and TRI-care team support, will generate a proposed solution, develop a data-informed projection of that solution's impact on outcomes, cost, and youth/family satisfaction and have youth/families review the solution and provide support for implementation and evaluation. With this approach we will target five goals with 25 linked objectives. G1: expand capacity and access for youth/families with complex mental health needs to screen for and access trauma-focused/trauma-informed screening, prevention, and EBP treatments. G2: improve youth/parent/family (YPF) engagement and influence with service/resource stakeholders, via engagement and retention efforts and training, e.g., trauma/resilience, PCE, suicide, SUD. G3: integrate YPF voices with lived experience in key system partners as advisers and advocates while also providing direct support to youth via youth partners (noms, quad-screen), and either support existing or establish YPF-led support groups for each county. G4: improve stakeholder and community capacity to improve youth connectedness in communities, schools, support groups, PCE enhancing opportunities, and socc's to reduce depression, suicidality, and self-harm. G5: assess, engage, and support socc's to support improvement in local SOC initiatives through increasing YPF membership and input and by implementing CI/RBA supports to intentionally address resource and service needs. Implementation and evaluation support will 1) collect, manage, and report data for performance measurement and continuous quality improvement; 2) complete all documentation outlined in application; 3) sustainability planning; 4) disparity impact statement; 5) needs assessments; and 6) to complete an integrated systems, process, and outcome evaluation.