S.C.A.T. Mission Statement: To serve as consultants to the leaders and caregivers of Illinois communities, to provide crisis intervention services in the immediate aftermath of a critical incident, to help local leaders and caregivers identify at-risk individuals to ensure they are provided necessary mental health services, to seek opportunities within Illinois communities to enhance public awareness of the effects of trauma, and to provide necessary information and assistance to Illinois communities on how to cope with a traumatic incident which affects members of their community.
The Illinois S.C.A.T. Project is a statewide network of over 2,000 volunteers trained to assist Illinois communities during and following a traumatic incident. S.C.A.T. volunteers include representation from diverse professional affiliations within the school and community arena. S.C.A.T. volunteers are trained in the National Organization for Victim Assistance’s (NOVA) Crisis Response Training (CRT) model, which has been nationally recognized in the field for over 20 years. The S.C.A.T. Project has 35 certified S.C.A.T./NOVA trainers.
MHAI coordinates Illinois’ S.C.A.T. volunteers, provides ongoing technical support, educates and trains volunteers across the state. S.C.A.T. volunteers:
- Serve as consultants to community leaders;
- Provide direct crisis intervention services to victims and survivors – helping people begin to feel safe and secure in the school community, helping people develop an understanding of what happened and how it is affecting them, and helping people cooperatively develop plans for dealing with issues and/or problems caused by the tragedy; and
- Provide supportive counseling to victims and survivors - providing education, encouraging physical and mental health, developing problem-solving exercises and coping strategies, and facilitating quests to try to put the tragedy in perspective.
Since its inception in 1999, S.C.A.T. volunteers across Illinois have responded to well over 250 incidents, including two national responses in collaboration with NOVA. Fifteen teams of over 62 S.C.A.T. volunteers were sent by MHAI to New York and New Jersey to assist NOVA over a nine month period in their response to 9-11. In addition, eight S.C.A.T. volunteers assisted NOVA in their response to the California fires in November 2003 and 15 volunteers assisted NOVA in their response to Hurricane Katrina.
S.C.A.T. volunteers are recognized by the Illinois Department of Human Services, Division of Mental Health as the volunteer response group utilized during the time of a crisis in Illinois and legislation was passed in 2002, indemnifying S.C.A.T. volunteers in the Illinois School Board Code.
