NAMI Wisconsin programs

Crisis Intervention Team Training

NAMI Wisconsin’s Fox Valley affiliate piloted a Crisis Intervention Team Training program for law enforcement in 2004, the first in the state of Wisconsin, based on the Memphis Model of CIT.  Nationally recognized for its effectiveness, CIT training helps law enforcement personnel learn to recognize basic signs and symptoms of mental illness along with skills to de-escalate a crisis situation.

What does the course include?

• A comprehensive, five day, 40 hour training
• Twenty-five hours of classroom training
• Fifteen hours of experiential training through tours of community sites, ride-along experiences with human service workers, and role playing scenario training

CIT trainings in Wisconsin will be posted on the Calendar

Click here for the CIT Resource Center.

Family-to-Family Education Program

The Family-to-Family Education Program is a 12-week course for families of individuals with severe mental illness designed to foster learning, healing, and empowerment within those families.  Trained family members teach the course.

What does the course include?

• Current information about schizophrenia, major depression, bipolar disorder, panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, borderline personality disorder, and co-occurring brain disorders and addictive disorders
• Up-to-date information about medications, side effects, and strategies for medication adherence
• Current research related to the biology of brain disorders and the evidence-based, most effective treatments to promote recovery
• Gaining empathy by understanding the subjective, lived experience of a person with mental illness
• Learning in special workshops for problem solving, listening, and communication techniques
• Acquiring strategies for handling crises and relapse
• Focus on care for the caregiver: coping with worry, stress, and emotional overload
• Guidance on locating appropriate supports and services within the community
• Information on advocacy initiatives designed to improve and expand services

The Family-to-Family Program is offered at no cost to the participants.  Created by Joyce Burland, Ph.D., the Family-to-Family Program has become an integral program within the NAMI Wisconsin organization, and has brought hope, understanding, and acceptance to families affected by mental illness.

Click here for NAMI National's Family-to-Family Resource Page

Family-to-Family Education Program Teacher Training

NAMI Wisconsin sponsors the training of Family-to-Family Program teachers. 

Click here for upcoming Family-to-Family teacher trainings.

In Our Own Voice

In Our Own Voice (IOOV) is a unique, informational outreach program developed by NAMI that offers insight into the recovery now possible for people with severe mental illness. 

In Our Own Voice shows how people with serious mental illnesses cope with the realities of their disorders while recovering and reclaiming productive lives with meaning and dignity.  The program provides a safe way for consumers to share the ups and downs of their recovery and learn from others.

What does the program include?

• Two trained presenters give personal testimony about their journeys with mental illness through dark days, acceptance, treatment, coping skills, and successes, hopes, and dreams.
• Target audiences include: consumers, families, mental health service providers, educators, students, law enforcement personnel,  professionals, faith communities, and all people wanting to learn about mental illness.

Contact NAMI Wisconsin if you would like to schedule an In Our Own Voice presentation in your community.  NAMI Wisconsin also sponsors the training of In Our Own Voice presenters.  Click here for NAMI National's In Our Own Voice Resource Page

NAMI Basics Education Program

The NAMI Basics Education Program is an education program similar to Family-to-Family that is designed for parents and other caregivers of children and adolescents living with mental illnesses. The NAMI Basics course is taught by trained teachers who are the parents or caregivers of individuals who developed the symptoms of mental illness prior to the age of thirteen years.

The course includes six two and one half hour classes of instructional material, discussions and interactive exercises offered in a series of weekly classes, or on consecutive Saturdays, to accomodate the time constraints of families with children.

NAMI Wisconsin provides training of NAMI Basics Program teachers annually. 

Click here for NAMI National's Basics Resource Page

Click here to find a NAMI Basics class in your area.

NAMI Basics Education Program Teacher Training

NAMI Wisconsin conducts NAMI Basics Education Course teacher training annually.

Check the Calendar for information on the next training.

NAMI Connection

NAMI Connection uses the NAMI Connection Principles of Support to provide support for people living with mental illness. People learn from each other's experiences, share coping strategies, and offer each other encouragement and understanding. NAMI Connection groups offer a casual and relaxed approach to sharing the challenges and successes of coping with serious mental illness.

NAMI Connection groups meet weekly for 90 minutes at one location. Meetings follow a flexible structure without an educational format. NAMI Connection groups do not recommend or endorse any medications or other medical therapies.

Attendance is optional and confidential. People are free to attend whenever they feel the need, and new participants are always welcome.

NAMI Connection groups are run by trained facilitators living with mental illnesses who are at a point in their recovery where they can "give back" to others. Everyone is a valued participant. NAMI Wisconsin provides NAMI Connection facilitator training as needed.

Click here for NAMI National's Connection Resource Page

Click here to find a NAMI Connection Recovery Support Group in your area.

NAMI Peer-to-Peer Program

Peer-to-Peer is a unique, experiential learning program for people with any serious mental illness who are interested in establishing and maintaining their wellness and recovery.  The course was written by Kathryn Cohan McNulty, a person with a psychiatric disability who is also a former provider and manager in the mental health field, and a longtime mutual support group member and facilitator.

What does the course include?

• Peer-to-Peer consists of nine two-hour units and is taught by a team of three trained "Mentors" who are personally experienced at living well with mental illness.
• Participants come away from the course with a binder of hand-out materials, as well as many other tangible resources: an advance directive; a "relapse prevention plan" to help identify tell-tale feelings, thoughts behaviors, or events that may warn of impending relapse and to organize for intervention; mindfulness exercises to help focus and calm thinking; and survival skills for working with providers and the general public.

Click here to access NAMI National's Peer-to-Peer Resource Page

Click here to find a Peer-to-Peer class in your area.

NAMI Provider Education Program

The NAMI Provider Education Program is a 10-week course that presents a penetrating, subjective view of family and consumer experiences with serious mental illness to line staff at public agencies who work directly with people with severe and persistent mental illnesses.  The teaching team consists of five people: two family members trained as NAMI Family-to-Family Education Program teachers; two consumers who are knowledgeable about their own mental illnesses, have supportive relationships with their families, and are dedicated to the process of recovery; and a mental health professional who is also a family member or consumer.

What does the course include?

• Gives providers a personal view of the hardships that families and consumers endure, and an appreciation of the courage and persistence it takes to recover
• Emphasizes the involvement of consumers in the challenging work of provider-staff training
• Reflects a new knowledge base, the "lived experiences" of coping with a mental illness or supporting a loved one who struggles with this challenge
• Adds a means of teaching the emotional aspects of these illnesses and the practical consequences of mental illness to the academic medical information in the course
• Includes deeply personal perspectives, having an appreciable impact on the program's content

In written evaluations and in focus-group surveys, providers reported that the course was fresh, relevant, helpful, enlightening, and emotionally overwhelming.

NAMI Support Group Facilitator Training

Joyce Burland, Ph.D., who wrote the NAMI Family-to-Family Education Course, recognized that support groups need structure in order to provide maximum benefit to its members.  She created a group facilitator training course that teaches facilitators the basics of groups dynamics and processes, effective facilitator leadership styles, and strategies to use for problematic group dynamics. 

Click here for information on the next Support Group Facilitator Training.

NAMI Support Groups

NAMI Support Groups are peer "work groups" of people who are joined together for mutual understanding and support for coping with serious and persistent mental illness.  These structured groups, led by trained facilitators, are often organized by the relationship to the relative with mental illness, for example, parents, spouses, or siblings.  Other support groups are organized by the mental illnesses, such as, depression, bi-polar disorder, schizophrenia.

How does a Support Group operate?

• Groups meet at various locations: NAMI local affiliate offices, churches, schools, or places of business.
• Attendance at NAMI Support Groups is optional.  People are free to attend whenever they feel the need.
• People may attend a Support Group when loved ones are in crisis. Some may want knowledge about community mental health resources. Others attend to provide support for other group members.

Click here to find a support group in your area.

Parents and Teachers as Allies

Parents and Teachers as Allies is an in-service mental health education program for school professionals. The two-hour in-service program focuses on helping school professionals and families within the school community better understand the early warning signs of mental illnesses in children and adolescents and how best to intervene so that youth with mental health treatment needs are linked with services. It also covers the lived experience of mental illnesses and how schools can best communicate with families about mental health related concerns.

The components of the in-service include the following:

• Welcome and Introductions - an education professional, who is also a family member, welcomes the school professionals and introduces the topics to be covered, often with a personal story.
• Early Warning Signs of mental Illness - a facilitator walks the school professionals through the early warning signs of mental illnesses, closely following the P&TA publication.
• Family Response - a parent or caregiver of a child with mental illness covers the predictable stages of emotional reactions among family members dealing with the challenges of mental illness and the lived experience of raising a child with mental illness.
• Living with Mental Illness - a mental health consumer that experienced the early onset of mental illness shares a view from the inside, including a disccussion about the positive and negative impact that their school experience had on their life.
• Group Discussion
• Closing Remarks and Evaluation

This program is designed for teachers, administrators, school health professionals, parents and others in the school community.

Check the Calendar for information about the next P&TA training.

Peer-to-Peer Mentor Training

Mentors are trained in weekend-long training sessions, supplied with teaching manuals, and are paid a stipend for each course they teach. 

Click here for information on the next Peer-to-Peer Mentor Training.

Planning For The Future

Planning For the Future is a training developed by NAMI Wisconsin addressing the concerns and needs of aging, older families who want to assure the quality of life for their loved one with a disability through the use of life plans, trusts, estate planning, and the like.

Planning For the Future trainings will be posted on the Calendar