Describe wrap-around services for emotionally disturbed children and adolescents

Answer 1

Wrap-around services have become the predominant method of service delivery for emotionally disturbed children and adolescents. Wrap-around services are community-based services that attempt to prevent the necessity for more restrictive levels of care. As the term wrap-around suggests, this is a comprehensive array of professional services that includes the child's home and/or school setting. The essential features of this service approach entail individualization of services to fit the specific needs of each child and family, maximization of the strengths of the child's family and natural support systems as resources, and attention to the cultural values of the child's family and community in the way that services are developed and delivered (Furman, 1997).
As an almost necessary adjunct to wrap-around services, the notion of flexible funding has come into use. This concept allows for funding to be used for development of nontraditional services such as respite care, which allows for brief "cooling off" periods during times of high emotional crisis when the child can temporarily be cared for outside the home. Mentoring programs are another example of highly successful nontraditional services in which successful members of the community are encouraged to volunteer as companions to troubled youths of similar culture and background, as a means of providing guidance and stability through the relationship.

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