Families often need help getting accessible, quality services for their children. As children mature, they also require supports to advocate effectively for themselves.  An advocate is someone who can guide you through the complex maze of services, rules, regulations and personalities that control the children’s system of care.  An advocate works to ensure that all service decisions are family driven, youth guided, and -at age 18- youth driven.

Advocacy Resources

  1. There may be a local family advocate program in your area that can provide phone and meeting support.  To find family advocate programs in PA, click here. Some of these projects also provide youth-to-youth advocacy. We are currently compiling a list of youth advocacy projects and will post in the near future. If we did not list a current project, please contact us.
  2. PA Roadmap to Help. These resources are useful in addition to local advocates or when no local advocacy resource exists.
  3. Take a friend, family or neighbor for support. Just having someone with you that takes written notes and can squeeze your hand under the table can help a lot. And it is important to have a written record of what is discussed.

Self-advocacy Resources

The Family Perspective:

The Youth Perspective: