Behavioral Health Services
A Better Way offers expert, trauma-informed Behavioral Health Services to some of the Bay Area’s most vulnerable children, youth and families. We are dedicated to serving children and youth who are in – or at risk of entering - foster care. Our support, treatment and parent training helps these families overcome the impact of poverty, community violence, mental health problems, addictive illness and patterns of child abuse and neglect that put their children at risk. All of our services are designed to heal children, improve care-giving relationships, and increase families’ self-sufficiency.
A Better Way’s Behavioral Health teams are made up of Therapists, Family Partners and Occupational Therapists - all highly skilled professionals with advanced training in Evidence Based and Evidence Informed Practices. Therapists offer family-centered, strengths- based counseling to help families develop the insights, communication skills, and behaviors that will help them reach their goals. Family Partners are members of the team who have personal experience advocating for their child within the educational, mental health, developmental or legal system. Family Partners help parents feel welcomed and supported, connect them with resources, and inspire them toward their very best. Occupational Therapists offer innovative and highly effective treatment to help children who struggle with issues such as Sensory Integration, trauma-related hyper-arousal and regulatory problems related to prenatal drug exposure.
Specialized Services
- Children between the ages of birth and five require comprehensive assessment and care provided by providers with advanced Early Childhood training.
- Children in Foster Care need services that are tailored according to their safety and permanency needs. (Permanency is a term describing every child’s legal and emotional right to grow up within the context of safe, loving, lifelong relationships.) Children in Foster Care achieve permanency through reunification or adoption – each of which can require specialized support services. Foster Children who do not have a permanency plan are particularly vulnerable and require focused, permanency-informed care.
A Better Way offers Behavioral Health services that are customized to the exact needs of the people we serve. Please see individual service descriptions for details.
Early Childhood Services
A Better Way’s Early Childhood Services are designed to deliver early intervention that facilitates the emotional well-being and optimal development of infants and young children, ages birth through age 5, at risk for emotional, behavioral, and developmental problems.
Our services include:
Developmental screening, assessment, and monitoring; Dyadic (Infant-Parent/Child-Parent) and family therapy; Parent training; Targeted family support services; Infant massage training and bonding classes; Parent education and support groups.
We work with biological, foster, and adoptive parents as well as any other significant caregivers who play a role in the child’s life. Any child between the ages of 0-5 with Full Scope Medi-Cal is eligible for these services. Services can be provided at the clinic or in the home.
Our Early Childhood Services are based on the following key elements:
Relationship-based: We listen carefully to families to help them identify, clarify, and address issues that may be affecting their developing relationship with their child. We also help parents become more attuned to the cues and needs of their children.
Strengths-based and Family Driven: We mirror parents’ best qualities and strengthen their capacity to provide safety and nurturance to their child. Our Family Partners help parents feel welcomed and respected – inviting them to engage fully in a Family-Driven treatment process. Our teams help parents see themselves as strong and loving parents. When new parenting skills are needed, we provide them with the training and supports that every parent deserves.
Access to state of the art care: We utilize evidence-based and evidence-informed interventions to assure that our community's neediest families have access to the best treatment available. Interventions such as Parent Child Interaction Therapy, Incredible Years Parent Training, Attachment and Bio-Behavioral Catch-Up help us provide effective care that empowers parents to raise children who are safe, loved, and connected.
Culturally-sensitive: Every family is a unique expression of overlapping cultures and identities. Part of every parent’s journey is to reshape the traditions and wisdom that they have absorbed as they form the culture of their new family. We understand how cultural values and beliefs are expressed in child-rearing practices, and we explore and honor caregivers’ views about how their child’s life should improve.
Developmentally-informed: We carefully assess the child’s strengths and vulnerabilities across various domains of developmental functioning including social, motor, cognitive, linguistic, regulatory, spatial and sensory domains.
Concrete help with concrete needs: We address concrete needs of families by helping them to access community resources and broaden their social support network.
These services are provided at our Berkeley and San Francisco offices.
Developmental screening, assessment, and monitoring; Dyadic (Infant-Parent/Child-Parent) and family therapy; Parent training; Targeted family support services; Infant massage training and bonding classes; Parent education and support groups.
We work with biological, foster, and adoptive parents as well as any other significant caregivers who play a role in the child’s life. Any child between the ages of 0-5 with Full Scope Medi-Cal is eligible for these services. Services can be provided at the clinic or in the home.
Our Early Childhood Services are based on the following key elements:
Relationship-based: We listen carefully to families to help them identify, clarify, and address issues that may be affecting their developing relationship with their child. We also help parents become more attuned to the cues and needs of their children.
Strengths-based and Family Driven: We mirror parents’ best qualities and strengthen their capacity to provide safety and nurturance to their child. Our Family Partners help parents feel welcomed and respected – inviting them to engage fully in a Family-Driven treatment process. Our teams help parents see themselves as strong and loving parents. When new parenting skills are needed, we provide them with the training and supports that every parent deserves.
Access to state of the art care: We utilize evidence-based and evidence-informed interventions to assure that our community's neediest families have access to the best treatment available. Interventions such as Parent Child Interaction Therapy, Incredible Years Parent Training, Attachment and Bio-Behavioral Catch-Up help us provide effective care that empowers parents to raise children who are safe, loved, and connected.
Culturally-sensitive: Every family is a unique expression of overlapping cultures and identities. Part of every parent’s journey is to reshape the traditions and wisdom that they have absorbed as they form the culture of their new family. We understand how cultural values and beliefs are expressed in child-rearing practices, and we explore and honor caregivers’ views about how their child’s life should improve.
Developmentally-informed: We carefully assess the child’s strengths and vulnerabilities across various domains of developmental functioning including social, motor, cognitive, linguistic, regulatory, spatial and sensory domains.
Concrete help with concrete needs: We address concrete needs of families by helping them to access community resources and broaden their social support network.
These services are provided at our Berkeley and San Francisco offices.
Therapeutic Visitation Services
Therapeutic Visitation Services are provided in collaboration with Foster Care Mental Health of San Francisco County
When a child or youth is placed in Foster Care, the County makes every effort to assure that they will have immediate and ongoing contact with their family while placed out of the home. In most circumstances, the County focuses their efforts on Reunification as the primary permanency goal. Therapeutic Visitation Services provided by A Better Way help these families maintain contact, improve family relationships, and develop the insights, skills and supports that improve their chances of reunification.
The main goals of Therapeutic Visitation Services are:
To help children heal from any trauma they have experienced (e.g. from abuse, neglect or family separation);
To assure that children maintain safe contact with parents and siblings;
To promote improved child-caregiver relationships; and
To help parents
Although we do not provide recommendations to the court about dependency status or placement decisions, we help families understand the requirements of their County service plans, and we inform the County of the family’s progress so that they can make informed recommendations to the court. Therapeutic Visitation Services can be provided at the clinic, and (with County approval) in community based locations such as the family home.
Many parents participating in Therapeutic Visitation Services have never had access to positive parent role models or parent-training. We offer them highly effective, state-of-the-art parent training and we coach them as they practice new skills of attunement, nurturing and safe limit-setting. We create the supportive atmosphere that allows parents to offer their very best to their children.
As families progress, we work with the county to adjust the treatment setting toward an increasingly natural structure – always seeking to offer families the least restrictive setting necessary to assure safety. This also helps adjust and modulate the level of support parents receive – assuring that they always experience the “optimal challenge” that promotes the development of new knowledge and skills without overwhelming them.
If the court determines that reunification is not an option, we provide the support that helps children experience a healthy transition to their permanent placement.
When a child or youth is placed in Foster Care, the County makes every effort to assure that they will have immediate and ongoing contact with their family while placed out of the home. In most circumstances, the County focuses their efforts on Reunification as the primary permanency goal. Therapeutic Visitation Services provided by A Better Way help these families maintain contact, improve family relationships, and develop the insights, skills and supports that improve their chances of reunification.
The main goals of Therapeutic Visitation Services are:
To help children heal from any trauma they have experienced (e.g. from abuse, neglect or family separation);
To assure that children maintain safe contact with parents and siblings;
To promote improved child-caregiver relationships; and
To help parents
- understand and address the safety concerns that led to the intervention of Child Welfare Services
- and develop and demonstrate the protective capacities that help parents keep children safe
Although we do not provide recommendations to the court about dependency status or placement decisions, we help families understand the requirements of their County service plans, and we inform the County of the family’s progress so that they can make informed recommendations to the court. Therapeutic Visitation Services can be provided at the clinic, and (with County approval) in community based locations such as the family home.
Many parents participating in Therapeutic Visitation Services have never had access to positive parent role models or parent-training. We offer them highly effective, state-of-the-art parent training and we coach them as they practice new skills of attunement, nurturing and safe limit-setting. We create the supportive atmosphere that allows parents to offer their very best to their children.
As families progress, we work with the county to adjust the treatment setting toward an increasingly natural structure – always seeking to offer families the least restrictive setting necessary to assure safety. This also helps adjust and modulate the level of support parents receive – assuring that they always experience the “optimal challenge” that promotes the development of new knowledge and skills without overwhelming them.
If the court determines that reunification is not an option, we provide the support that helps children experience a healthy transition to their permanent placement.
Pre & Post Adoption Support Services
Pre- and Post-Adoption Support Services offer individual and family therapy and clinical case management designed to meet the needs of children and youth who will be adopted, or have been adopted from the foster care system.
For a child in foster care with no prospect of reunification, adoption into a caring family is a lifeline. Parents who grow their families through adoption find that the experience is a gift to them as much as it is to their new child.
The joys of adoption, however, come with challenges. For the child and parents, there are very real emotional challenges involved in coming together as a new family. Our therapists receive specialized training to understand and help with all of the issues that Adoptive families experience before and after adoption.
Pre-Adoption:
At the Pre-Adoption stages, we help children, youth and parents understand these challenges and work through them together to build a strong, stable foundation. Often this involves helping the child develop a cohesive and appreciative understanding of his or her own past, and of the events and situations that led to a plan of adoption.
Work at this stage also involves helping the adoptive parents develop realistic, positive expectations for their family’s adoption journey. This can involve:
Post-Adoption:
This program offers Post-Adoption services until the child/youth reaches the age of 18. Often the process of coming to understand the adoption story must be renewed with each milestone. As children grow through each stage of development, emotional and behavioral issues can arise. Each time this happens, it is a challenge for the individual and for the family, but it is also an opportunity to work through these natural challenges in a way that strengthens their bonds and re-affirms their family’s love and commitment.
We offer expert parent training, family-driven, strengths-based therapy and innovative program design - including Occupational Therapy, a Digital Storytelling Lab, and Family Partners with personal experience adopting.
These services are offered at our Oakland/Fruitvale and Berkeley offices.
For a child in foster care with no prospect of reunification, adoption into a caring family is a lifeline. Parents who grow their families through adoption find that the experience is a gift to them as much as it is to their new child.
The joys of adoption, however, come with challenges. For the child and parents, there are very real emotional challenges involved in coming together as a new family. Our therapists receive specialized training to understand and help with all of the issues that Adoptive families experience before and after adoption.
Pre-Adoption:
At the Pre-Adoption stages, we help children, youth and parents understand these challenges and work through them together to build a strong, stable foundation. Often this involves helping the child develop a cohesive and appreciative understanding of his or her own past, and of the events and situations that led to a plan of adoption.
Work at this stage also involves helping the adoptive parents develop realistic, positive expectations for their family’s adoption journey. This can involve:
- Accepting and appreciating their own journey to the decision to adopt
- Honoring the child’s experience and birth family – keeping connections alive as much as is safely possible
- Helping the child avoid loyalty struggles as they attach to their new caregivers
Post-Adoption:
This program offers Post-Adoption services until the child/youth reaches the age of 18. Often the process of coming to understand the adoption story must be renewed with each milestone. As children grow through each stage of development, emotional and behavioral issues can arise. Each time this happens, it is a challenge for the individual and for the family, but it is also an opportunity to work through these natural challenges in a way that strengthens their bonds and re-affirms their family’s love and commitment.
We offer expert parent training, family-driven, strengths-based therapy and innovative program design - including Occupational Therapy, a Digital Storytelling Lab, and Family Partners with personal experience adopting.
These services are offered at our Oakland/Fruitvale and Berkeley offices.
Psychological Evaluation
All of our services rest on a foundation of respectful curiosity about each individual we work with. A person’s thoughts, emotions and behavior are shaped by the ways in which they perceive the world and the ways in which they understand those perceptions. We cannot see the world through another’s eyes, or feel the world from inside another’s skin. But we can develop a clear picture of many aspects of the intellectual and emotional processes that define a person’s perception and experience of the world. We are then able to offer this picture to children, youth and families so that they come to understand themselves more deeply.
One way to illuminate a child’s or youth’s inner world is through Psychological Evaluation. Our Psychologists gather important information from key people in the child’s life. When we have a sense of the child’s strengths and challenges, we use evaluation tools, carefully chosen to illustrate precise aspects of the child’s intellectual and emotional world.
The information we gather through Psychological Evaluation improves our understanding of what makes the individual tick. A summary of this information is shared with the family and the A Better Way treatment team – offering valuable insight that can enhance their ability to meet the child’s specific needs.
One way to illuminate a child’s or youth’s inner world is through Psychological Evaluation. Our Psychologists gather important information from key people in the child’s life. When we have a sense of the child’s strengths and challenges, we use evaluation tools, carefully chosen to illustrate precise aspects of the child’s intellectual and emotional world.
The information we gather through Psychological Evaluation improves our understanding of what makes the individual tick. A summary of this information is shared with the family and the A Better Way treatment team – offering valuable insight that can enhance their ability to meet the child’s specific needs.
Child & Adolescent Permanency Support Services
Child & Adolescent Permanency Support Services provide comprehensive mental health care, parent training and placement stabilization services to Alameda County children and youth (ages 5 – 21) and their families. This program is designed to meet the needs of children and youth who are in or at risk of entering the foster care system. We offer individual and family therapy in our clinic, in the community, or in the family’s home.
Services in this program help children and caregivers develop insights into the behavioral and emotional issues that precipitated treatment while also developing the skills and relationships that will allow them to thrive. For children and youth without a permanent and stable home, our services are designed to help the child/youth and their County Worker stabilize placement and develop a solid permanency plan.
Assessment and treatment are collaborative, strength-based and family-driven. We help people develop their own vision for success and identify the supports and obstacles that they may encounter as they move toward their goals. For county-involved families, we also help families understand any concerns that the county may have, and to shape treatment goals that take these concerns into account.
Operated through a contract with Alameda County Behavioral Health Care Services
Services in this program help children and caregivers develop insights into the behavioral and emotional issues that precipitated treatment while also developing the skills and relationships that will allow them to thrive. For children and youth without a permanent and stable home, our services are designed to help the child/youth and their County Worker stabilize placement and develop a solid permanency plan.
Assessment and treatment are collaborative, strength-based and family-driven. We help people develop their own vision for success and identify the supports and obstacles that they may encounter as they move toward their goals. For county-involved families, we also help families understand any concerns that the county may have, and to shape treatment goals that take these concerns into account.
Operated through a contract with Alameda County Behavioral Health Care Services