Tanya Hankins-Hollinger has a large family—the Pittsburgh native is the mother of four and a “nana” to four grandchildren—including two babies born this year. But her family also includes the parents and children she works with in her job as a Family Development Specialist (FDS) for the East Liberty Family Support Center, Kingsley Association.
“To stay connected with families and be involved with children, it’s where I get my fulfillment,” Hankins-Hollinger says. She has been working with families for about 16 years. She started out as a volunteer and then was hired by the Kingsley Association, which provides services to children, youth, and their families. “They actually recruited me and asked me if I could join and help put a Family Support Center in East Liberty,” she explains. And the rest, as they say, is history: Hankins-Hollinger has now been at the Kingsley Association working for the East Liberty Family Support Center for 11 years.
Hankins-Hollinger takes on the intense role of helping families involved with the Department of Human Services Office of Children, Youth and Families (CYF). Both Family Support and CYF share the same goal—to keep families together. “We just kind of get there a little differently,” she says. “There are a lot of situations that go on, and CYF may see it one way and Family Support sees it another. But when we work together we’re able to understand each other.” Family Support comes from a strength-based approach, an approach that, according to Hankins-Hollinger, CYF is moving toward. “Family Support is able to help CYF get to that strength-based perspective,” she says.
The partnership between Family Support and CYF has benefitted numerous families: Hankins-Hollinger shared the experience of one family she works with, a mother and her 11 children. The children had been removed from the home because the mother was experiencing domestic violence from her partner. “In the beginning, the mom would kind of make excuses for the abuse,” Hankins-Hollinger recalls. “At Family Support, we worked really hard with her to try to get her to understand that she doesn’t deserve domestic violence.”
Family Support also had a big impact on the services the family was receiving. “Because there were 11 kids, there were about 13 agencies working [with the family],” Hankins-Hollinger explains. And some of those agencies were providing overlapping services, such as instruction in parenting techniques. “We were overdoing it,” she says. “She actually had so many services that it was setting the family up for failure. So Family Support suggested that we come together as a team every month and we all give a report on what we’re doing and what the progress is.” The agencies followed through, having monthly team meetings for about a year and gradually weaning services out.
“By the end of her case she probably had about two or three services. She ended up successfully completing everything, getting all 11 kids back,” Hankins-Hollinger says. Today, the mother is working and CYF is no longer involved in her life, a notable achievement for a woman who had dealt with CYF “even as a little girl from her mom.”
Based on her years of experience, Hankins-Hollinger has some tips for Family Development Specialists working with families receiving services from CYF. “It is very important to commit,” she says. “Commitment means you definitely have to be a partner with that [family], and a communicator, and making sure that parents are following through and the agencies involved are following through.” She also recommends that an FDS not take more than two or three CYF families, because “you want to be able to focus your time and energy. You can’t just say you have a CYF [family], you have to be involved with all of the court hearings, all of the meetings that go on—just making sure that the family’s being serviced in the best way.”
Which is exactly what Hankins-Hollinger did for that mother of eleven. She still works with the mother regularly. “The mother is still very involved with Family Support. I still do monthly visits with her and she continues to attend programming at the Center. She’s doing really good—she’s definitely a success.” And that’s why Hankins-Hollinger does the work that she does for Family Support: “This is what fulfills me and makes me complete, is the outcomes with the families.”
*To contact the East Liberty Family Support Center, call (412) 362-7609.
