Nappanee Advance-News, Volume 129, Number 29, Nappanee, Elkhart County, 20 July 2006 — Page 30

Center offers new programs with additional space

By Anthony Gadson Editor Joan Andrews has witnessed many needs come through the doors of the Family Christian Development Center in Nappanee. Now after seeing a need for help with marital issues, the executive director of the FCDC is set to witnessed the building open its newest wing for its Marriage and Family Center last September. "In the United States, and in a lot of Christians, the divorce rate has risen over 50 percent," Andrews said. "I stand at the door, and see the problems come in. A lot of them have to do with loss of jobs, low school attendance rates, abuse in the home and alcohol or drugs." A root of all the problems may be broken families, which is why Andrews and the rest of the FCDC staff has worked to bring the Marriage and Family Center to Nappanee. "We're not saying, 'You ought to do this, or that,'" Andrews said about the purpose of the center. "We want to show how anything they do will affect children." The FCDC teamed up with Plymouth's Family

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Foundation's Director Paul Spasic, to help develop the program in Nappanee. "The same program is used in El Paso, N.M., and the divorce rate there has dropped by 79 percent," Andrews said. "With the divorce rates dropping, so too have many of the social issues." The program works in three different areas. The first area is training mentor couples in counseling couples who may be looking to get married, "FOCCUS, Marriage Preparation Mentorship Program"; the second helps train mentors to speak with couples that are married, and just, need a "spark", "More Than Just Married"; and the third area is the training of mentor couples to speak with couples that are considering divorce, "Choosing Wisely Before You Divorce." "That is the one that is probably going to be the very most needed," Andrews said about the third area. The FCDC will host workshops to train volunteer mentoring couples, with Andrews looking to have 21 couples trained in counseling married couples after November, and an equal amount of couples trained in counseling couples contemplating divorce. In developing the program, the FCDC has worked with the Nappanee Ministerial Society and the Elkhart County legal system. In working with the two, Andrews sees either pastors directing couples to the

program or couples being directed to it by law, which may be done so by divorce attorneys. Once a couple is trained in counseling, churches or r the legal system may direct a couple in need to them. The two couples meet where ever they see fit, and it goes from there. In starting up the program, the FCDC had to rely on the volunteer time of others, which it has received. Main Street Mennonite Church Pastor Ruben Chupp and his wife, Idella,

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will be co-directors of the program, while Arden and Evidean Graber are volunteer mentor trainers. Ken and Ruby Farmwald are the volunteer coordinators with Plymouth's Family Foundations program. "These are all volunteers donating their time," Andrews said. * While the center will serve the Wa-Nee community, it will also be a bi-county site, serving Elkhart and Kosciusko Counties. The marriage workshops are a big portion of what will be housed in the area lhat was used for head start in the past, but there will also be other services housed in the space. A Women's Care Center also has a room at the FCDC. The Care Center is a faith-based program for pregnant, unwed women. The Center offers testings and counseling, along with ways for the women to get baby essentials, such as cribs, high-chairs and everything else needed to care for a child through its 8.A.8.E. program. "You can't buy anything at the Center," Andrews said. Instead of conventional money, coupons are used to purchase items. The women earn the coupons by attending classes, and Andrews said that the items don't take very many coupons to purchase. "It is very, very do-able," she said. The 8.A.8.E. program, which offers the baby materials, is headed by volunteer 8.A.8.E. Site Director Meredith Wollman, R.N., and assisted by former FCDC Board of Directors member Brenda Miller. The Woman's Care Center Director is Julie Gonzalez, a bi-lingual nurse. The FCDC's existing Medical Assistance Program also moved into a new space in the north wing. Once the head start program moved out of the FCDC a number of years ago, file space remained empty, but with help from the community, it's been remodeled and set to house these needed programs. In helping to remodel the space, the FCDC used grants from the Kosciusko County Community Foundation and K 21st Century. Others helping were: Locke Construction, J &N Stone, Habitat for Humanity of Elkhart County Restore Shop, Bontrager Concrete, L.J. Wagner and Liz's Furniture Shoppe.

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