FARMINGTON — The Franklin County Children’s Task Force announces that registration is open for the FRANKLIN Resilience Institute, a 15-hour, three-day professional development opportunity designed to help teach youth and family serving professionals how to foster resilience-building, enhance effective communication strategies, and support healthy relationship development.

The institute will be held from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Monday to Wednesday, June 26 to 28, at the University of Maine at Farmington, North Dining Halls A-C. The conference fee is $60 a person, and includes lunch daily and contact hour certificates.

Conference attendees will receive practical tools from the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Reaching Teens toolkit to help assess agency practices through a trauma-informed lens, build skills to work with marginalized and traumatized youth (and adults), and learn how give control back to people who have lost control over their lives.

Reaching Teens demonstrates communication strategies for diverse health care, counseling, youth program, and educational settings, making the information relevant for social workers, clinicians, case managers, educators, mental health providers and other direct service professionals.

Workshops include:

? Nonviolent Communication, with certified international trainer Peggy Smith.

? The 7 C’s Model of Resilience.

? KJPR Films’ Resilience screening and discussion (follow up documentary to “Paper Tigers”).

? Protective factors in Franklin County.

? Resilience through the developmental lens.

? Overview of the Maine Resilience Building Network and its role in raising awareness of adverse childhood experiences and resilience in Maine.

? Weaving the Threads: Connecting local initiatives to better promote resilience and protective factors (panel discussion).

It is an initiative of FCCTF’s FRANKLIN Advisory Group: Friends Reducing Abuse and Neglect of Kids Living In Our Neighborhoods.

FMI, register: rwhitley@fcctf.org, 207-778-6960, bit.ly/2r8pccF.