To Ontario FASD parent/caregiver groups
Could you facilitate a focus group in your community BEFORE Aug. 20?
CANFASD Family Advisory Committee is suggesting an opportunity for parents/caregivers & people with FASD to provide input before Aug. 20 on what kind of FASD research is needed in Canada BEFORE the event they are hosting, “FASD Research: Learning Together” in Regina Aug. 29-30.
The insights from your community group will help directly inform the discussions that will take place at the “FASD Research: Learning Together” workshop being held at the end of August at the University of Regina. This workshop is being hosted by Canada FASD Research Network (CanFASD) in collaboration with the Family Advisory Committee. The Family Advisory Committee has a dual mandate of informing researchers of research priorities for parents and caregivers and communicating the results of FASD research to parents, caregivers and individuals with FASD in a clear, easily accessed and understood manner.
The workshop in August will bring together a group of parents and researchers and will be organized around the findings from a national survey and community groups like the one you are hosting. The workshop will focus on key issues raised by participants and caregivers/parents across Canada and will highlight current research and strategies to provide effective supports for families and individuals with FASD across the lifespan.
As this workshop is being held in Regina, we want to collect as much feedback as possible to inform the discussion. We hope you can host community meeting(s) with parents/caregivers in your area and collect their feedback and send it to Dorothy Reid by August 20, 2016. This feedback will directly inform the discussions at the August workshop. CanFASD will report back to each community group after our meeting in August, suggesting a plan to take action on the key issues that arose from the Regina workshop.
To assist you in planning the community group discussions we suggest the following:
1) Please send participants the following link about CanFASD and the Family Advisory Committee prior to your meeting: www.canfasd.ca
2) Identify a quiet place to have a discussion so that you can easily hear one another.
3) Organize your discussion around the key questions (see attached). The questions are meant as a guide to generate comparable discussions between participants.
4) Towards the end of your meeting, please confirm with your group the key themes you heard for each question and jot down those key points in the notes section.
5) Confirm with your group if they would like to be added to our email list for updates after the August workshop in Regina.
6) Email your notes to Dorothy Reid (reidwellness@gmail.com) by August 20, 2016 including contacts to add to our outreach email following the Regina workshop.
KEY QUESTION FOR GROUP DISCUSSION
1) What kind of FASD research has been the most useful for you in the past?
Notes:
2) What aspects of living with FASD would you like to see more research done on?
Notes:
3) What would be your ideal way of receiving FASD research results (example: email updates, podcasts, hard copy newsletter, etc.)?
4) What kinds of strategies and supports for people with FASD would you most like to see researched?
5) What do you think are the most pressing concerns for people with FASD as they age that we might explore through research?
6) What do you see as emerging physical or health related issues for people with FASD?
Number of participants: _____ Discussion(s) hosted by: ____________________
Contact information for Host (email): _____