2022 Impact Report

December 2022

2022 Impact Report

2022 Impact Report:

Note: Due to repeated delays in a multi-year capacity building allocation and county-funding resource limitations, we were forced to condense our offerings to the Buncombe County Dept of Juvenile Justice exclusively between June 1, 2022 through September 30, 2022. Since that time of limited subsidized collaboration, we have re-engaged with the county’s Veteran Treatment Court and Adult Drug Court Diversion programs.

At the time of this report the organization has served 242 individuals in Buncombe County with our therapeutic adventure work. Of the 242 served, referring agencies include: local community-based BIPOC educational support organizations; county treatment and court diversion programs; and low-cost sober living programs.

Unique community members served include: 8 BIPOC young adults; 7 adult, male halfway house clients; 13 Buncombe County Treatment Court women; 18 Buncombe County Treatment Court veterans; and, 13 14-18 year old, court-involved youth. Each outing is composed of 3-5 different therapeutic groups throughout the day with each of these clients populations. Last year, 65% of all county diversion program graduates were PIVOTPoint participants.

We began utilizing the Adventure Therapy Experience Scale assessment tool to track outcomes; then found in culmination of our ATES data, that it wasn’t targeted enough of a measure to provide us quantitative results that were applicable to our program delivery type. ATES is designed for immersion wilderness therapy, and we had hoped that our day program model would be capturable. It was not. We have utilized a more appropriate assessment tool tracking our program’s intended outcomes integrating Feedback Informed Treatment (FIT) measures through MyOutcomes. FIT assessments are given at the beginning and end of each outing. The ORS given at the beginning looks at how the client is doing individually, interpersonally, socially, and overall.

The SRS given at the end of each outing focuses on the therapeutic alliance and measures relationship with staff/group, goals and topics covered, approach/method used, and overall. We also created specific pre- and post-outing outcome tracking that measured our program's intended outcomes at the beginning of each outing through looking at each client’s life outside of PIVOTPoint and at the end of each day measured them throughout the outing itself. Through our work we see in our outcome reporting that our clients learned to set boundaries, stand up for themselves, recognize what they can and can’t control, how to communicate healthily and respectfully, positive self-worth assessment, healthy emotional regulation, self-advocacy, how to build relationships with others, and many more pro-social skills.

Clients also reported “leaving” the following in the wilderness on our outings: anxiety; toxic relationship patterns; sadness; guilt; shame; resentments and insecurities, people-pleasing behavior; fear of failure; hopelessness, and many other maladaptive, self-deprecating patterns.

Our clients reported that they learned a variety of coping skills and ways to practice taking care of themselves including: breathing techniques; cooking for themselves; prioritizing their feelings; trusting others; healthy boundaries; self compassion; exercising; acceptance; mindfulness; self-respect; self-trust; hygiene; and taking things less personally. We saw tears, huge moments of clarity, life changing realizations, friendships forged, and a build up of resiliency. It’s been an honor to get to be a part of the impact this collaboration with Dogwood has made and it’s fueled the establishment of our organization's role in our recovering and healing community.

We have been working with Steven Javorski, PhD candidate Professor, Child and Youth Care at Vancouver Island University for the past 3 years. His guidance, academic, and practical experience in the wilderness & adventure therapy field has resulted in the creation of effective Likert Scale assessment surveys which are used at the beginning and end of each outing and have resulted in the following outcomes: