3/7/11

So... what do YOU do?

You know when you meet someone for the first time and they always ask the standard questions... where did you move from? where are you living? and what do you do?
I hate these questions mostly because I dont know how to explain things simply... "we moved from St. George but we were originally from San Diego, but not really, I moved here after college and Richard grew up between here and Bakersfield..."
ANYWAY, the reason I bring this up is because A LOT of people have been asking me what I do... I'm not actually sure, the title doesnt describe what I actually do, so it provokes a long explanation... I'll explain it once so everyone knows and understands... AND here we go...

When I lived in San Diego before, I worked for a non-profit organization that helps kids and families. This organization SAY SAN DIEGO {look it up} has programs all over San Diego all focused on different things.

I worked for a family resource center that happened to be on a middle school campus. This resource center called FSS- or family support services, has many programs, groups, activities, etc for the families in the Southeast San Diego community. My job was "student advocate."

Teachers would refer students who were having issues... anything from academic, social, emotional, family, medical, anything and everything. It was my job to be the 'case manager' for the family/ or student and provide them with resources to solve their problems.

When we decided to move back to San Diego, I emailed my old boss and asked her if she knew of any jobs in the company that she would refer me for.  She told me that they had a new program at FSS and they were looking for a program director to run it {and I would be perfect for the job of course :)}

My job title is PROGRAM SUPERVISOR and the program is called  Southeast San Diego Health Access Partnership.

Basically, the program provides access to health care resources in Southeast San Diego (aka the ghetto) I have two staff that are outreach workers and case manager for families in the area. We help people sign up for Medi Cal, we help people find doctors for their specific health concerns, we help students who need glasses but cannot afford them, anything health related.

Once a month we have a alternitive health night where accupuncture and chiroprators give FREE services. We also have healthy cooking classes, mobile dental and health clinics, health education workshops, really anything you can imagine.

We go to city council meetings and PTA meetings and rec meetings and pretty much every other meeting that is held in the community. We do presentations for parenting classes and after school programs...
Basically, we do A LOT!

I work at the same school site that I did before, but I dont work with the kids like I use to {i miss those little buggers}. Its a lot more work, but a lot less stress, which is perfect and I LOVE IT! I love my job and the people that I get to work with.

So as you can see, its pretty lengthy to explain what I do... and when people ask, so you're at your old job? I say, well yes but no... well, it's complicated.

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