Program News 2009
Annual Retreat Offers New Experiences and Bonding Opportunities
For the past eight years, young women from our Family Foster Care (FFC) and group residential programs have attended an autumn retreat at Ramapo Camp . Ramapo provides recreational experiences promoting personal growth to children and adolescents with emotional or behavioral difficulties.
Good Shepherd has worked in partnership with Ramapo over the years to develop and refine the retreat, which focuses on the importance of caring connections. Participants engage in physical challenge and trust-building activities, such as a high and low ropes course, to help develop social, physical and problem-solving skills.
"I'm afraid of heights, but I like to try new things," said Cynthia, a resident of Marian Hall who attended the retreat, and "felt very good" about her successful completion of the high rope course, as well as the rock wall climb. "We set a life goal, and pretended the goal was at the top of the wall," she explains.
For these and other activities, the young women would partner with another attendee that they didn't already know. Peer-to-peer support is an important part of the retreat. The intensity of the retreat combined with the shared experience of being in foster care leads naturally to opening up to one another about their pasts and the challenges they currently face. "I feel much closer to the girls I live with since Ramapo," says Cynthia, who also added that the residential attendees had also made plans to meet for dinner with their FFC counterparts following the trip.
Time with adults was also important. The Good Shepherd staff earned the respect of the girls by sharing in the physical challenges, and the Ramapo employees were on hand to guide everyone through the experience. "They were really funny," Cynthia said of the Ramapo staff, "and we learned a lot from them."
Back in the city, Cynthia encourages other residents to attend the next retreat. "It was a great experience," she says, "I made new friends and learned a lot."
November 6, 2009
