Brooklyn, NY --In just over a decade, from 1982-94, the number of homeless children in New York went up by 409%, according to New York Department of Homeless Services figures. Among those who are addressing the problem is nursing instructor Lula Mae Phillips of Long Island University's Brooklyn Campus.
For the past ten years Phillips and her sister have opened their hearts to the homeless, feeding them and becoming foster parents to homeless children. For two years, they cared for seven children and, more recently six, three of whom had been sexually abused.
Determined to reach out to homeless children on a larger scale, Phillips, a Bushwick, Brooklyn resident, began the Long Island University Childhood Wellness Program this past June. It delivers nutrition, safety and health education to parents--mainly single mothers--and their children, at the Salvation Army-run Bushwick Family Residence in Brooklyn.
Phillips and 20 volunteers from the Brooklyn Campus nursing program visit the residents two mornings a week. Thirteen student nurses, one RN, and six graduate nurses (nurses who have a bachelor's degree in nursing) are currently involved.
The Program was well received by the shelter residents, with 25-30 parents and 20 children voluntarily attending. (Families can stay in the Bushwick Family Residence for up to two years and there is room for 80 families.)
Phillips was surprised at first by how many children as old as 14 didn't know how to brush their teeth, groom themselves or sit properly in a chair. "The parents have so many issues to deal with that sometimes they overlook the basic things that children need to know," she says.
Working with the children, volunteers go over bathing, toileting, and toothbrushing. The youngsters also are taught how to dial 911. Their parents are advised of services available to them such as free dental care.
According to Phillips, "Many parents didn't know that you shouldn't leave small children in the tub alone. We teach them how to keep a log of the medication their kids take and the illnesses they have had, what questions to ask regarding medication, and how to recognize diseases like the measles. We give CPR training and talk about the kind of information that they should bring to their children's doctors appointments."
Upon completion of the six-week course, parents receive a certificate of participation showing that they have completed the Long Island University Childhood Wellness Program. The first group of graduates were honored at a ceremony on the Brooklyn Campus in December. In addition providing health education, Phillips is introducing homeless parents and children to higher education by holding the graduation on campus and telling them about LIU/Brooklyn's four associate degree extension programs located in the Crown Heights, Ridgewood/ Bushwick, East New York and Bedford Stuyvesant communities.
"Besides conveying basic parenting information to them, we also raise their awareness about health care issues such as stress, asthma and hypertension that middle-class people read about in magazines like Good Housekeeping, says Phillips. "In fact, I studied several years of back issues of women's magazines for ideas," she adds.
The oldest of eight children born in North Carolina, Prof. Phillips, RN, is a minister at the Christian Calvary Ministry in Bushwick, Brooklyn. She and one of her sisters fed homeless people on the street for ten years. They began by cooking soup, making sandwiches, and distributing them in Grand Central Station, Port Authority, and other areas. After a few years of doing this, they began to distribute fruit and vegetables donated to them by produce companies and were dubbed the "Midnight Riders" for delivering cases of produce to homeless encampments in Brooklyn and Manhattan in the wee hours of the morning. ###
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