Nominated by Philip Eller of Parent to Parent of New Hampshire, Ann Justice is the Coordinator of the Kids on the Block program of the Special Needs Support Center in Lebanon. Ann has coordinated this puppet troupe of five other volunteers for 10 years and arranges performances that take place all over the Granite State. Kids on the Block uses life-size puppets in skits about disabilities and other social issues that are presented to about 3,000 to 5,000 elementary school students a year. Ann's efficiency, friendliness and energy make the Kids on the Block program a great success.

Ann Justice was one of 20 New Hampshire citizens recognized by the New Hampshire Children's Trust Fund as citizen leaders in their community.

The New Hampshire Children's Trust Fund supports community-based programs that prevent child abuse and neglect through grant-making, evaluation and special projects. For more information, visit www.nhctf.org.

Peter Bleyler is the President of the Board of Directors of the Special Needs Support Center in Lebanon. He is also the coordinator of the Upper Valley Regional Special Olympics Program. Nominated by Philip Eller of Parent to Parent of New Hampshire, Peter's outstanding commitment and energy and great people-skills are his special gifts to these two agencies which serve families with special needs.

Peter Bleyler was one of 20 New Hampshire citizens recognized by the New Hampshire Children's Trust Fund as citizen leaders in their community.

The New Hampshire Children's Trust Fund supports community-based programs that prevent child abuse and neglect through grant-making, evaluation and special projects. For more information, visit www.nhctf.org.

The Fall 2006 Annual Giving Campaign (AGC), which combined our separate Direct Mail and Memberships Drive efforts, more than doubled the highest previous amounts raised - to almost $29,000. Under the hard-working guidance of Toni LaMonica, previous Board president, the Annual Giving Campaign committee of Board and non-Board members succeeded far beyond its initial goal, and set the stage for continued high private donor support in future years.

In addition to over 150 individual donors of the AGC, our major funding support came from: PathWays of the River Valley, NH Special Medical Services, NH Partners in Health, Upper Valley United Way, the Kettering Family Foundation, the Byrne Foundation, the Dwinell Charitable Trust, and several smaller grants.

Staffing and one program were also included in the changes seen this year at SNSC. After six months of consideration the Board decided to appoint Philip Eller as permanent Executive Director to replace Maryellen Sullivan who had been with us for 17 years. He will function as administrator as well as continue targeted direct program delivery. And, the Programs Coordinator, Pam Blair, was increased to full time at the start of FY'08 to cover the areas previously served by Philip. Consultants help deliver some of the specific Community Partner programs and a contracted grant writer provides expertise on a few foundation proposals. The contract of the NH Partners in Health program, which has been with SNSC for five years, was not renewed for FY'08, but we look forward to continued close collaboration with this important service to parents of children with chronic health needs in the Lower Grafton area of NH as coordinated by Ellin Mehrbach. Nancy Tantillo continues as our part time Administrative Assistant, and our new bookkeeper, Lori Shipulski, has "filled the big shoes" of Nancy Archibald who held that position for 17 years.

We continue in our same location on Flynn Street in Lebanon, and this year we upgraded our phone system to now include DSL, which is a considerable assistance in our work. We also purchased a new main computer to replace one that died. Some minor office reconfigurations will enable us to provide even better service for individuals and small groups in the future. We obtained a new domain name for our website: www.snsc-us.org but our old names will link automatically into this one. We are in preparation between staff and Board committees, to update the site in FY'08 as well as produce a new SNSC brochure and pdf downloads from our website of our various programs and services.

Our Board, with five new members this year, is led by President Pete Bleyler, and is energized to meet the challenges of the future by adopting four goals for the '08 Fiscal Year (July thru June):
1) increase our visibility in our geographic service area,
2) review all SNSC programs for effectiveness and to ensure each furthers our mission,
3) expand financial support from individuals and Upper Valley businesses, and
4) increase the number of grants requested and received. This year the Board said farewell and many, many thanks to the following members: Toni LaMonica, Hope Charkins, Ellie Pierce, and Kathy Marshall.The FY'08 Board members are listed on the last page of this report.

• Information and Referral/ Emotional Support/ Special Needs Advocacy:
      Over 130 parents and professionals received these services this year from the Upper Valley region.
  
• Educational Advocacy: 25 parents - from Bradford to Charlestown, from Tunbridge to Grantham.
  
• Educational Workshops: 20 parents - at five workshops co-sponsored with either the Parent Information Center (PIC) of NH or PIC of VT.
  
• Quarterly Newsletter: over 550 recipients of our newsletter produced now quarterly on a regular basis.
  
• Nathan Hall Library: use by a number of parents and professionals alike.
  

• Contacts (phone, email, website, national listserve) were made with almost 200 parents and professionals - from the Upper Valley, around New Hampshire, and around the country. Some were for Information & Referral only, but 85 involved matching requests of parents. new to the situation of having a child with a special need, to talk with a veteran parent who "has already been there, done that."
• We trained six new Supporting Parents at a day-long workshop and these wonderful people have been added to our Network to call upon as appropriate.
• Our website www.p2pnh.org continues to provide a great source of connection and information links for parents as well as professionals. We created an Online Supporting Parent training module to serve training desires of parents who are unable to attend a day-long workshop training. We plan to advertise and implement this service considerably in the next year.

• Happenings (social and recreational activities for teens and young adults) - 3 great dances this year (Halloween, Valentines Day, and Spring Formal) were well attended by sometimes almost 100 young people and a good number of parents. We started a Pizza and Bingo night this year that proved quite popular, as did our two summer picnics. The Christmas Yankee Swap is always a hit. Having a regular Happenings event every month has contributed to a very loyal following of people who really look forward to seeing each other at the events. Their friendships and open acceptance of each other are a beautiful sight to behold. Erin Ward helped facilitate many of the Happenings events, along with Philip and Pam.
• Connections - 12 children with special needs were served this year through the Big Siblings program that matches Dartmouth students for a weekly get-together with a Big Brother or Sister. Because of some program changes, we had only one Medical Buddy (from Dartmouth Medical School) matched with a young person this year; but, with our experience this year we are ready to expand this program again next year.
• Girl's Night Out - 8 or 9 young ladies were involved in a monthly outing for supper and a movie. GNO is arranged and supervised by Robin Goodrich. We expect to add new types of events in the next year.
• Young Men's Group - five young men- four regularly- attended 15 sessions of a social skills group in the Spring/Summer this year, and learned what it takes to be "an honorable man." This group was led by Dr. Gary Viterise.
• Sibshops - 9 young people who have siblings with a special need attended one or more of the eight Sibshops held this year led by staff from SNSC in collaboration with PathWays, the CHaD Family Center, and the Boyle Community Pediatrics program. Pam will take over coordination of this program next year from Philip.
• Kids Day Out - 7 young children with a special need participated in the 2007 summer in this Sunday outing activity organized and sponsored by SNSC in response to the generous volunteer offer from Mee Soon Largohr, a student at the Vermont Law School. She apparently has inexhaustible energy and a desire to work with kids with a special need like her older sister. This program reflected SNSC's typical responsiveness to either a special need or a special opportunity for our families and young people.

• 50 skits performed for 19 different audiences/location reached 2640 students and staff this year. A puppet skit on Obesity was introduced this year and goes quite well with one bought last year on Healthy Snacking. They provide a great one-two presentation on this "hot topic" for children in the USA. Our five "experienced" puppeteers are led by Ann Justice, Coordinator, and include Barbara Payson, Bev Strout, Merry Converse, and Barbara Whitman. They dedicate every Thursday of the school year to going anywhere in NH or the Upper Valley-Vermont to perform these entertaining skits.

• 24 families which included 56 children, and included 2660 hours of service received respite support this year, in the form of either financial assistance and/or a respite provider. Pam continues to do a good job of "parsing out" our limited funds that we have for respite care. Some parents are able to contribute some to the respite cost; some are very short term respite situations, others are longer; most involve families that have a child with a special need, but this is not necessarily a requirement to receive help.

• Served 43 families in direct support activities, funding support, and coordination.
• Continued a second year of Community Initiative grants to three local organizations (the Ray School, the Indian River School, and the Carter Community Building Association) for children's playground equipment and grounds work. Over $18,000 was distributed to these organizations this year - for the purpose of creating more accessible playgrounds for children throughout Grafton County.

With Pam being full time as Programs Coordinator, we will be able to organize even better programs in the Community Partners areas, especially a regular monthly Happenings calendar plus extra events at times. Educational advocacy will continue to be a major, unique, and valuable service of SNSC that we expect will continue to increase in demand. With the assistance of the Board's Programs Committee we plan to both evaluate our present programs/services, identify program and services gaps that parents feel they need, and then work to respond to these needs.

Our budget for FY'08 contains some challenges for Board and staff in the goals set for the Annual Giving Campaign and for Special Events and in amounts for new foundation grants and similar funding sources. We all will be focusing on these areas in the new year in order to stabilize our staffing and thus our program services.

SNSC will continue as an "umbrella" fiscal agent for three programs/grants. The STAR (Steps Toward Adult Responsibility) program will be working toward receiving its own IRS nonprofit status within the next year. DEAF support group will use our umbrella for its fiscal needs while it serves families of children that hard of hearing or deaf. We will complete the fiscal requirements for an UVUW grant that was made to the Early Childhood Mental Health Network that is working on developing a family resource center in the Lebanon area.

Overall, SNSC will continue to fill a unique niche in the social services network of the Upper Valley as the only generic support program for parents and families of children with ALL kinds of special needs.