While the COVID-19 pandemic has certainly put a strain on non-profit services across Oklahoma, Parent Promise was able to continue serving families and breaking outcome records over previous years.
Parent Promise has published its 2019-20 Annual Report, which runs from July 1, 2019 to June 30, 2020. In all outcome areas, Parent Promise has exceeded previous years’ by serving more families, completing more home visits and adding additional more than 600 additional family visits through the new RightTrack program with Integris Baptist Medical Center.
“We have stayed connected with our client families, and we have grown our services to new families, even as the pandemic started to sweep across our service area during the third quarter of our fiscal year,” said Sherry Fair, executive director. “Our programming staff was able to switch gears quickly, and even though we suspended in-home visits, we found a way to stay connected with our families by phone or virtually, and we continued providing them concrete supports they needed to get through this crisis.”
Fair said Parent Promise parent educators and parent aides have done a tremendous job of keeping connected with their families and helping them through the uncertainties brought on by the pandemic.
“We have actually increased the number of completed visits with our families by having the ability and flexibility to do our visits virtually or by phone,” Fair said. “During the days when our community was pretty much shut down, we helped families with their children by delivering them activities and lessons they could do at home.
“As many of our families are isolated even in non-pandemic times, we were able to provide the cleaning and household supplies that were in short supply,” Fair said. “Our families appreciated our being able to help them keep their families safe and well with these valuable supplies.”
Fair praised the response of community foundations and supporters for stepping up to make sure Parent Promise services went uninterrupted.
“We can’t thank the foundations and supporters enough for allowing us to be flexible in meeting the needs of our clients,” Fair said. “Their support and guidance have certainly helped us maintain high levels of services for our families.”
