Branching Out Support Services announces some ‘New Growth’

Written By MIKE BAKER

2020 has been the most challenging, yet rewarding year of Kim Van Ryn's professional life. 

Since launching Branching Out Support Services in downtown Orangeville last December, Kim has worked tirelessly to build a unique program designed to provide opportunities to some of Dufferin County's most vulnerable residents. First and foremost, Branching Out offers day programming for adults with developmental disabilities, or differences as Kim likes to say. 

From 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, the organization, located on First St., is home to an active, professionally supported day program specially designed for individuals with a variety of developmental diagnosis. At present, there are 13 individuals registered in the Branching Out day program.

“Here, the focus ranges from social, to recreational, to developing job skills, to providing work placement opportunities and even more,” Ms. Van Ryn told the Free Press. “Developing life skills takes a primary position in all of our daily activities, but our number one emphasis is always on relationship building, creating connections and making sure our people are enjoying themselves and having a good time while they're with us.”

While the organization has, largely, enjoyed a year of progression and growth, it certainly hasn't been easy, Kim explained. While having to contend with a months-long global pandemic, which is still running rife and showing no signs of going away anytime soon, Kim has also had to deal with all the usual obstacles that come with starting up a new business. 

It has led to some long, sleepless nights over the past few months, but, despite all of that, Kim counts herself as one of the lucky ones, and for good reason. While many businesses were forced to close their doors back in March, when the pandemic hit, Kim was handed a lifeline by the provincial government when her operation was deemed to be an essential service. 

“We were super fortunate that we could continue to be operational, and we were only able to do that because we fell under the mental health category,” Kim explained. “As well as our day program, we also offer what I call a respite service. What that means is we provide supports to individuals so that their families can get a bit of a break. So, because that respite component of our work counted as mental health support for families, we were able to keep doing that.”

The majority of Kim's frontline staff – she now has five full-time and seven part-time employees – were able to keep working throughout the opening months of the pandemic. While the organization's space on First St wasn't considered to be open, it could accommodate up to two individuals at a time. To supplement that, Branching Out also offered a wealth of online programming, setting up sessions with clients twice a week.

“They were very structured – we would do dance classes, workout classes… Basically, anything we would have done in our day program, we tried to replicate and put on the computer,” Kim said. “Some of them worked out really well, and some not so much. We probably did about 40 of these online sessions in total.”

Branching Out finally returned to “somewhat normal” operations in September, opening up right after Labour Day. The somewhat refers to the fact that the day program is running four days a week, rather than five, right now, while all drop-ins, choice programming, and teacher/instructor visits have been cancelled until further notice. This has led to a slightly reduced core group, Kim says, with around six individuals on site throughout the day. 

As well as the 13 people serviced through the day program, Branching Out supports another 12 or 13 people “out in the field”, which essentially translates to in-home services. That's a number that has been steadily growing in recent weeks, with more individuals and families seeking our local supports. 

To supplement that increased demand for service, Branching Out has pivoted to launch an entirely new venture – New Growth Life Skills and Respite.

Back in September, Ms. Van Ryn was made aware of a space, at the rear of her current location on First St., becoming available. While putting together her initial business plan for Branching Out, Kim had dreamt of securing a location that would have enabled her to run a day program, and have space left over to create an apartment that would allow her, and her staff, to teach critical life skills to clients. 

While that dream, ultimately, didn't come to fruition, Kim has transformed this new facility into a space that, she says, will do wonders for her program and her clients. Kitted out with a full kitchen, bedroom and living room, the New Growth facility officially opened up earlier this month. 

“I've really done some research over the past few months into this kind of service, and from the feedback I've gotten from local residents, it seems like there's a gap between what people need and what's currently available,” Kim said. “There are quite a few people who, if they're not engaged with organizations like Kerry's Place (Autism Services) or Community Living Dufferin, they are sent out of town (for respite services). And it costs a fortune to send these people to places in Peel Region, or Simcoe County.”

She added, “We have parents who have adults living with them who probably have not had a proper night off in over 20 years. When you think about that, there's no way we couldn't move forward on this.”

And while one of the main purposes of New Growth is to provide that layer of support to families of people with disabilities, its main aim is right there in the name – to give clients the opportunity to grow. 

“Most people are able to leave home at 18 or 19, move into a dorm, or an apartment with a buddy and learn some very valuable life skills. Our people, unfortunately, do not have that chance. It's not a thing for them. It's not safe. There are no opportunities,” Kim said. “We feel it's important to try to replicate those opportunities as best we can, so we imagined something a little different.”

Explaining how things will work at New Growth, Kim said there are options both for younger people, whose parents just need some time off, and for adults wanting to learn some key life skills.

“Families will be able to have their person picked up from school if they go to school, or picked up from home, and come here to do homework, have dinner, and watch a movie,” Kim said. “And for our adults, we've set up different packages. So what we'd do is set up a meeting with their family to decide what their goals are, and what the individual hopes to learn and achieve.”

Up to two people – a client, and a worker – can stay overnight in the New Growth space. 

“Typically, the way we've planned it out, an individual would spend a first weekend with their support person to do an assessment and see what they know and what they can do. Then the support worker would start to pull back. That doesn't mean they would leave them alone here, but it would mean things like, the individual is in charge of planning a meal on their own,” Kim noted. “We would give them a push by asking them to put a grocery list together, finding out what fresh groceries we need to buy… Maybe we need to go to the library to get a cook book to find a recipe for something – things like that, which helps them gain a sense of independence.”

She continued, “For the adults, New Growth is much more goal-oriented, and a skill-based program as opposed to just a parent having a night off. We would really like to engage people here who really have some goals and make it very focused work so that they're learning a lot while they're here.”

While neither Branching Out, nor New Growth services are free, Kim says she's always willing to work with families to ensure people with disabilities aren't left behind. Anyone with an interest in having a family member enrolled in Branching Out services, is encouraged to contact Kim directly at kimbranchingout@gmail.com. 

Having come such a long way in a short space of time, Kim says she's content with “settling down” over the next few months. With the big launch of its day program service, and the recent addition of New Growth, it's been a year of continuous progression for Kim and her team. Now, they want to take a little time to focus on what they have and work towards building something really special here in Orangeville. 

“We definitely have a 10-year plan, one which hopefully will see us be able to add a country property to our in-town service, but that is very much a long-term plan. For now, we just really want to focus on the service we have, and really perfecting what we do,” Kim said. 

She concluded, “We're here now, and we're serving our community. For me, this is one of the most challenging dreams come true. I can't wait to see what the future holds.”