CASA Volunteer Spring Training Schedule Announced

Your next opportunity to become a CASA volunteer and change the future for an abused or neglected child is coming up in April.

CASA of Lexington will hold a training class for new volunteers beginning April 6 at its Lexington office, 3245 Loch Ness Dr. The training is for people interested in advocating for children in the family court systems of Bourbon, Fayette, Garrard, Jessamine, Lincoln, Scott, or Woodford counties.

After completing the 30-hour training course, each Court-Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) volunteer is matched with an abused or neglected child in the family court system. They visit with the child every month, talk to adults involved in the child’s life and review medical and educational records. Then, they provide the information they gather to the judge on the case and make recommendations for actions that would be in the child’s best interest.

Family Court judges in CASA of Lexington’s service area say CASA reports and advocacy regularly change the course of a child’s life and lead to better outcomes.

“You have to be a judge to see how much CASA does,” Fayette County Family Court Judge Traci Brislin has said previously. “CASA is always there; they’re always paying attention; they’re always kind of filling in the blanks.”

CASA volunteers typically give 5-10 hours a month and commit to serving for at least two years. Research has linked CASA advocacy with many positive outcomes for the children served, including better grades and behavior at school, more stability while a child’s case is open and a greatly reduced likelihood that a child re-enters the foster system after their case closes.

The spring training class will graduate and be sworn in by a family court judge on May 30.

To sign up for the training, you can fill out an application at www.casaoflexington.org/apply. You can also learn more about the training and see the full schedule of classes at www.casaoflexington.org/training.