RECENT ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Expanding Access to Financial Services

• We spearheaded a collaboration of financial institutions, community partners, and state and federal banking regulators to connect unbanked and underbanked state residents with mainstream financial services — including affordable checking, savings, and credit opportunities. Appleseed served as the catalyst for the formation of "Bank on Connecticut", a statewide 2010 effort to better serve unbanked and underbanked residents that is endorsed by State Treasurer Denise Nappier, Connecticut Banking Commissioner Howard Pitkin and the FDIC.

Improving Children's Access to Dental Care

• Dental Access – CT Appleseed Accomplishments
• A collaborative 2007 advocacy success in which Appleseed had helped to persuade the state to fix the state’s dental Medicaid program is paying big dividends. After materially increasing Medicaid reimbursement rates, the number of dentists treating Medicaid children rose by more than 700 in just two years.
• For a third consecutive year, Board member Dr. Mike Perl led the fund-raising for an immensely successful, weekend-long 2010 dental clinic that provided free dental care to more than 2,000 patients who cannot afford dental care. Appleseed provided pro bono lawyers to draft release forms for dentists at this "Connecticut Mission of Mercy" (CTMOM).

Public School Education

We distributed roughly 4,500 copies of our 5 handbooks that demystify complex education law issues for parents and began holding “Ask a Lawyer” parent forums across the state to discuss these issues. Our bilingual handbooks cover the following topics:

• Special Education: The Policies and Your Rights After the Planning and Placement Team (PPT) Process
• Zero Tolerance Suspension & Expulsion Policies
• Bullying and Your Rights
• The Nuts and Bolts Of How Your School Is Funded
• Rights and Regulations in Working Proactively with your Child’s School District & Teacher

Our "Keep Kids in School: Improving School Discipline" project deployed a team of pro bono attorneys to interview officials and teachers in 9 key school districts across the state to find cost-effective means of conducting in-school suspension. Our findings, intended to redirect school districts' disciplinary policies toward retention and away from suspension and expulsion, will be issued in a major report late in 2010.

Homelessness

• Hartford Homelessness – CT Appleseed Accomplishments
• We partnered to launch the Hartford "H.E.L.P." program which providespro bono legal assistance to homeless individuals each week at twoHartford shelters. Connecticut Appleseed recruits the local attorneys, prompted development of a training manual for the volunteer lawyers and administers the program. In its first 9 months, 33 free legal clinics provided assistance to more than 130 individuals.

Elder Law Education

• We distributed free copies to over 1,250 seniors of the 100-page book “Connecticut Elder Law Resources” in more than 45 attorney-led workshops at 37 senior centers across the state.

Mental Illness and the Criminal Justice System

• We partnered with NAMI-CT to develop and distribute a 57-page guide entitled “Understanding the Criminal Justice System: A Guide for Adults with Mental Illness, Advocates and Families". Appleseed printed 1,000 copies for NAMI-CT to distribute. NAMI reports that response to the guide has been excellent.

Connecting Through Literacy Inmates with their Children (“CLICC”)

• In 2009, after recruiting partners and training volunteer mentors, Appleseed successfully conducted a pilot test at the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury, CT of our literacy program that helps children stay connected with their incarcerated and distant parents by jointly reading books and discussing them over secure e-mail. A grant application decision by the U.S. Department of Justice in August, 2010 will determine whether the Federal Bureau of Prisons will have funding to replicate this program at its facilities in other states.