Grace        Fran      Anthony    Julie      Keenan    Allison    Daniel      Jen

LiveWorkPlay is a small grassroots organization that is always pushing to do more to support people with intellectual disabilities to have a good life. From the beginning the ability to accomplish our goals has always been challenged by limited funds, and staff have in turn been challenged to go above and beyond, day in and day out. You can find out more about the staff team by clicking on their names in the links above. Click here for contact information.

 STAFF VISIONING 2009 

There wasn't time for a staff visioning retreat this year, but ongoing weekly discussions, the shared experience of the Community Living Ontario annual conference in Kingston, and the outcomes from LiveWorkPlay Visioning Day have combined to offer some clear directions.

LiveWorkPlay needs to continue to "de-program" which means supporting people to enjoy an included life in the community. Life is not a program, and the mission of LiveWorkPlay is to support self-advocacy and citizenship. Services, projects, and programs can all be important means to help people with intellectual disabilities develop and follow their dreams. But they are not an end, they are only a means to an end. Nobody has a life dream of being in a program.

With this in mind, it is all about doing more of the same (only better) in 2009-2010. This means helping people with their employment goals, to move to a home of their own, to enjoy healthy relationships with others, and to be in charge of their own life decisions.

There are barriers to overcome. This includes everything from poverty to mental health issues to unfavourable public attitudes. There are no easy answers, only hard work. And we are ready.

STAFF VISIONING 2008 

The revised staff team (Jennifer was on maternity leave so Daniel attended along with Julie, Keenan, and Grace) travelled to Markham to take part in the Community Living Ontario annual conference. The days were long and intense. The team split up to take part in as many learning opportunities throughout the 5 days (which included the pre-conference as well as the Annual General Meeting) as possible and then spent several hours each evening reporting on individual findings and discussing how they might apply to LiveWorkPlay.

The outcomes of the week strongly influenced the agenda for Visioning Day, which focused on working with people with intellectual disabilities and their family members to focus on the challenge of identifying which LiveWorkPlay services are most important, and how the entire LiveWorkPlay community can work together to deliver what it is people feel they really need.

Some of the factors that influenced this focus include the pending move to individualized funding as well as the recognition that one of LiveWorkPlay's biggest strengths is its long record of listening and responding to people with intellectual disabilities and their family members. There is even more that parents and other family members are willing to do, and it will be important to harness that spirit of cooperation in light of new funding models. 

STAFF VISIONING 2007

This year's staff visioning was again a combination of professional development, discussion of findings from Visioning Day, and planning for the coming year. The team benefitted from a two-day workshop with Dr. David Burns, who was visiting Ottawa making for a terrific opportunity. The staff travelled to Montreal in 2006 for a different Burns workshop, and after a year of putting some of those ideas into practice it was both a valuable refresher and an introduction to some new ideas this time around. One staff member was even up on stage for several minutes to practice a counselling technique.

A few weeks earlier the team also had the opportunity to attend the international Social Roles Valorization conference which was held in Ottawa this year. Participation in that two-day event had a direct impact in that the simple concept of "A Good Life" came up several times in an SRV context, and may well prove to be the best initial answer in the search for a response to "What does LiveWorkPlay do for people with intellectual disabilities?"

One of the serious issues affecting all organizations serving people with intellectual disabilities is staff turnover. LiveWorkPlay offers a stimulating but very demanding environment. It is hard work that demands a high degree of emotional maturity with limited financial rewards. You can help LiveWorkPlay and other organizations with future staff recruitment by speaking out about the importance of their work and the need for appropriate compensation and benefits.