Registration, Hotels & Agenda

Join your colleagues from across the state on September 24 & 25, 2024 at the Conference Center in beautiful Lake Placid, NY for the NYS Office of Mental Health and ACT Institute for Recovery-Based Practice ACT Symposium.

Join your colleagues from ACT Teams across the state! Systems are transforming with a focus on integrated care and specialized ACT Teams. Together we can share and learn best practices and discuss what this transformation means for ACT teams. This symposium will explore ACT as an evidence-based model; its core practices, operations and structure; ACT team dynamics, and much more.

All ACT providers in NYS, including team members, quality assurance staff, finance departments, and administrators are invited to join us.

The symposium will also provide a platform where teams can exchange ideas and learn from each other. Workshops will help teams in strengthening their daily practice, including specialist roles.

Hotel Reservations

Conference Venue:
The Conference Center at Lake Placid
2634 Main St, Lake Placid, NY 12946

A block of rooms has been set aside at a discounted rate for conference participants at the following hotel near the conference venue:

Crowne Plaza

101 Olympic Dr, Lake Placid, NY 12946

To make a reservation, call the Crowne Plaza at 518-523-2556 and identify yourself as making a reservation for the NYS Mental Health/ACT Conference. If rooms are still available, you will receive the discounted rate.

ACT Symposium Goals

Participants will recognize what is new for ACT – where we are in the moment.
Participants will apply skills in the areas of outreach, engagement, motivation, and transition.
Participants will recognize fidelity to the model and apply the NYS ACT Fidelity Tool.
Participants will review trauma-informed care practices and multicultural awareness.

Keynote Speaker: Melanie Funchess

Ms. Melanie Funchess, CEO and Principal at Ubuntu Village Works, LLC, has served as an advocate for families and youth for three decades. Ubuntu Village Works, LLC is an organization dedicated to the creation of culturally responsive community-driven healing and wellness spaces as well as helping organizations become more culturally responsive both inwardly and outwardly facing. She also serves as the Director of Mental Health and Wellness at Common Ground Health, a health planning organization serving the 9 county Finger Lakes Region in New York. Melanie has worked extensively in the areas of family engagement and empowerment as well as community building. She presents, trains, and consults locally and nationally in the areas of cultural competence, culturally responsive practice, implicit bias, family engagement, community partnership building, racial trauma and healing, and mental health in communities of color. She also has a TEDx Talk Implicit Bias -- how it affects us and how we push through available on YouTube.

Ms. Funchess is involved in several national and community-based coalitions and organizations such as The Child, Adolescent, and Family Branch Council for the Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), The National Network to End Disparities in behavioral healthcare (NNED), African American Leadership Development Program (AALDP), African American Health Coalition (AAHC), Black Women’s Leadership Forum (BWLF), Greater Rochester Black Agenda Group (BAG), Greater Rochester Parent Leadership Training Institute (PLTI), Community Task Force for School Climate (CTF), Roc The Future Parent Engagement Community Action Network (PECAN). She also served as a Commissioner of Schools for the Rochester City School District.

She is a devoted wife and mother of four children (two boys and two girls). Her mission is to use her knowledge of systems and communities to create culturally responsive spaces for healing and opportunities for youth and families to be empowered and successful. To rebuild the village, where every child is our own, we have front porch neighborhoods, and we use language that respects everyone.

Agenda at a Glance

VIEW FULL AGENDA

Tuesday, September 24

7:30am – 8:45am

Registration & Coffee with Vendors (Breakfast is included in the host hotels or on your own)

8:45am – 9:00am

Welcome

9:00am – 9:45am

Keynote Presentation:

Culturally Responsive Care for Children and Families

Melanie Funchess, CEO, Ubuntu Village Works, LLC

9:45am – 10:00am

Break with Vendors

10:00am – 11:15am

Concurrent Sessions

1. The Added Value of Peer Support Specialists on ACT Teams

2. How to Work Collaboratively and Communicate Effectively with Bureaucracies and Institutions

3. Safety in the Community

4. The Power, Importance and Impact of Language

11:15am - 11:30am

Break

11:30am – 12:45pm

Concurrent Sessions

1. ACT and Employment: An IPS Perspective

2. New York State Assisted Outpatient Treatment (AOT); A Systemic Overview and Engagement Considerations for Assertive Community Treatment (ACT)

3. New York State ACT Fidelity Scale

12:45pm – 1:30pm

Lunch

1:30pm – 2:45pm

Concurrent Sessions

1. Forensic ACT in New York City

2. Utilizing Recovery Oriented Cognitive Therapy (CTR) for ACT Teams

3. Reexamining our Approach when Working with People that are Using Drugs and Alcohol on ACT

2:45pm – 3:00pm

Break

3:00pm – 4:15pm

Concurrent Sessions

1. How Are You Doing?

2. Your Partners for Success - NYESS Regional Employment Liaisons

3. Cultivate Our Workforce: Provide Input for Recruitment & Retainment Strategies for ACT Teams

Wednesday, September 25

(Breakfast is in your hotel stay if booked through the registration portal or on your own)

8:30am – 10:00am

General Session: New York State Initiatives for Assertive Community Treatment

10:00am – 10:15am

Break

10:15am – 11:30am

Concurrent Sessions

1. Safety in the Community for ACT Providers: Practical Guidance and a Discussion

2. Forensic ACT: Overview and Implementation Strategies

3. Implementing Harm Reduction and Overdose Prevention Practices

11:30am – 11:45am

Break

11:45am – 1:00pm

Concurrent Sessions

1. Expansion With a Purpose: Starting a New Team

2. Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) State Process & Funding Model

3. The Impact of Culture on Community-Based Treatment

1:00pm

Adjournment