Transcript The Nest

FIRELIGHT
Marketing, Research, Media & Public Communication Consultant
Prepared by: Journey McAndrews│ January 2013 │ Contact: (859) 619-0962
The Nest
Center for Women, Children, and Families
“35 Years of Care, Compassion, and Commitment”
Introduction
The Nest is a non-profit center located in downtown
Lexington, Kentucky and has served women, children and
families in Central Kentucky for more than 35 years.
The Nest states that it makes available “a safe, accessible
and healing environment for children, while developing
the strength and self-sufficiency of women and families
through education, support, counseling and advocacy.”
“You must be the change you
wish to see in the world.”
Mahatma Gandhi
Role & Function
Mission Statement
“Peace cannot be achieved through violence, it can only
be attained through understanding.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“The Nest—Center for Women, Children and
Families is a local, nonprofit organization that
promotes healing, stability and well-being of
children and families. Our holistic approach
includes respite child care, parent education and
support, domestic violence counseling and
recovery, and crisis care services for fragile
families.”
Overview
“A small body of determined spirits fired by an
unquenchable faith in their mission can alter
the course of history.”
Mahatma Gandhi
During more than 35 years within the Lexington community,
The Nest has offered a wide-range of services to all people, but
as an organization its primary function is to serve the domestic,
social, and emotional needs of women, operating secondly in
service to the needs of children, and thirdly addressing specific
(often crisis related) needs of families (such as court-ordered
parenting classes).
The Nest offers four core programs:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Self-Help Parenting
Domestic Violence Counseling
Crisis Care
Childcare
History
35 Years in Retrospect
While its fundamental role and function within the community has
remained essentially the same, The Nest has undergone numerous changes
throughout its 35 year history.
The biggest change came in 1996 when two other community based
organizations—the Women’s Center of Central Kentucky, and the Lexington
Child Abuse Council, merged. These two organizations had been around
since 1977, and their role and function within the community were
combined to form The Nest Center for Women, Children and Families in its
current incarnation.
Central Kentucky then had one organization that addressed the domestic,
physical, and emotional needs of women and children in crisis and helped
them go on to recover and live more fulfilled, safe, and productive lives.
History
35 Years in Retrospect
During its history, The Nest has provided childcare, domestic abuse
intervention and counseling, parenting classes, food, clothing, diapers,
education, learning, mental health counseling, emotional support,
community outreach, and many more services to thousands of
families across Central Kentucky.
History of the Building
The Nest is located on North Limestone Street in a historic
Federal Style building known as The William Morton House. In
1795 “Lord” William Morton purchased the land where The Nest
resides for one sterling shilling and built his home in 1810.
When Morton died, he left the property to his daughters who
then sold it to Cassius Clay in 1836.
The property was sold yet again in 1850 to Dr. Warfield who
conveyed it to his wife Elmira upon his death, and she then sold it
to Lily Brand Duncan in 1873.
After Duncan’s death, her daughter (who was also named Lily)
sold the property to the city of Lexington in 1913 and the area
became formally known as Duncan Park.
Brief Overview of Services & Functions
Women
1. Respite childcare
2. Domestic abuse
counseling and
referrals
Children
1. Daily childcare for
children (who attend
regularly)
3. Crisis case
management
2. Emergency
childcare for crisis
situations
4. Referrals for
medical care, rent
assistance, etc.
3. Prevention of
sexual, emotional, and
physical abuse
5. Assistance and
counseling for starting
over after leaving an
abusive relationship
4. Neglect prevention
6. Circle of Healing
Support Group
5.Education-based
childcare program
6. Three-STARS rated
childcare facility
7. Reindeer Express
8. LBGT Youth
outreach and events
Families
1. Stabilization of the
family unit
2. Parenting classes
(court ordered and
otherwise)
3. Food, clothing,
diapers, and
distribution of other
needs-based material
goods
4. Emotional support
5. Educational
materials and events
6. Family
enhancement events
and programs
The Nest
35 Years in Service to the Community
Childcare

The most significant and dynamic aspect of The Nest is its childcare
and respite childcare programs.

Childcare is provided during the weekdays for children from birth to
five years.

The Nest offers traditional childcare for working parents and also free
respite childcare for parents who have nowhere else to turn for brief
childcare assistance. This aspect of the childcare program functions
as a means to prevent child abuse and offers parents a safe place to
leave their children during times of crisis or emergency.
Childcare
There are four core beliefs and aims promoted through childcare programs at The Nest
1. Nurture
Listening leads to nurturing when individuals and
families come in with emergency needs.
2. Encourage
Providing child care encourages parents to know they
are not alone in raising their child.
3. Support
Counseling survivors of domestic violence supports
families in becoming whole again.
4. Teach
When you support The Nest, you teach our
community that when we work together to strengthen
families our entire community will be stronger.
A Creative Twist on Community Involvement

The childcare division of The Nest opened a new chapter in community
involvement by using a concept a simple as “Story Time Heroes” to
invite community leaders, politicians, local business owners, and
celebrities in to read to the children (usually dressed as a character in a
popular children’s book).
Jeffery White, Executive Director at The Nest, said “Story Time Heroes
serves two functions; one is that it allows children who may have been
abused to come in contact with caring adults they do not know, thus
enhancing their sense of security” and helping them negate their fears,
and second, “Story Time Heroes gives The Nest an opportunity to invite
people in to participate in what the organization does, people who may
not know about the organization otherwise.”
Volunteers Make all the Difference
“You must not lose faith in
Like many non-profit organizations, The Nest would not exist without dedicated
volunteers who have contributed so much during its 35 years in operation that it is hard
to fully measure all of the kindness, goods, services, and hard work.
The tireless effort of volunteers allows The Nest to provide for the needs of women,
children, and families who have nowhere else to go for help. Indeed, it is the combined
commitment of the staff, board members, and volunteers that allow the organization to
provide uncompromised care and compassion to the community it serves.
In addition, donors, students, businesses, and various funding agencies are also vital to
the organization’s ability to carry out its role and function within the community.
humanity. Humanity is an
ocean; if a few drops of the
ocean are dirty, the ocean
does not become dirty.”
Mahatma Gandhi
Domestic Violence Counseling and Intervention
“Our lives begin to end the
day we become silent about
things that matter.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.
The Nest focuses most of its attention on the
needs of women in crisis by offering domestic
violence counseling, respite childcare, approaches
and exercises in Positive Psychology, The Circle of
Healing Support Group, Relationship Recovery
Workshop, special events like The Clothesline
Project, Self-Help Parenting classes, and Life Skills
classes that help “parents develop skills needed for
good parenting and job security.”
Promoting Awareness Through Education
Child Abuse Prevention & Recovery
The Nest promotes child abuse awareness, offers counseling, support, and preventive techniques to parents and
caregivers, and helps heal the wounds of child abuse by offering a safe, caring, and nurturing environment for the
children in its childcare and respite childcare programs.
Putting the pieces back together, one child at a time
“Breaking” Old Barriers with New Mindfulness

Recently The Nest reached out to other areas of the
community that need help with issues of bullying and violence.

In partnership with organizations such as Lexington Fairness,
GLSO, and PFLAG, the staff and board members of The Nest
addressed issues of bullying, discrimination, and violence
directed at those in Central Kentucky’s gay, lesbian, bi-sexual,
and transgendered communities.

The most notable anti-bullying and anti-violence event
supported by The Nest was last year’s “Breaking the Silence”,
which was hosted at the historic Kentucky Theater in
Lexington, and featured a program that explored the
discrimination and violence Lexington’s LGBT youth face.
Reindeer Express (more than a holiday tradition)

Reindeer Express is an annual event that has been around
for more than twenty years. While this event is based in
customary holiday traditions of offering charity and
assistance to those in need, the event is about more than
just giving children presents, providing food for families,
and clothing the needy, because Reindeer Express allows
The Nest to “express” some of its core beliefs and carry
out its mission to provide care for the people in Central
Kentucky who need it the most.
Reindeer Express 2012
More than 600 families in
Central Kentucky received
an invitation to attend
Reindeer Express in 2012
Meet some of the “Nesters”
Carol Whipple
Developmental Director
Shelly Sowell-Ginter
Associate Director of Child Care
Jenny Morris
Child Care Director
Sharon Kopyc
Director of Clinical & Community Services
Jeffery White
Executive Director
Sheri Estill
Director of Crisis Case Management Program
Get Involved
The Nest needs the help and support of volunteers, businesses, and people throughout the
community.
Items in need of constant replenishment:







Diapers
Food
Children’s clothes (birth to age 5 years)
Cleaning supplies
Office supplies
Monetary donations
Food, coffee, and drinks are also welcomed during community events
For more information, or to make a donation . . .
The Nest
530 N. Limestone Street
Lexington, KY 40508
(859) 259-1974
(859) 254-9465 Fax
Jeffery White, Executive Director
[email protected]
Carol Whipple, Development
Director
[email protected]
www.thenestlexington.org