January 23, 2020 – Fort Meade personnel and family members will soon have a new way to access resiliency services from mental health resources to nutrition counseling to music camps for kids.
Members of the Fort Meade Alliance have been constructing a Resiliency Resources kiosk. In recent months, members of the Military and Family Committee and the Education Committee researched local resources that fall under the five Resiliency pillars – Family, Emotional, Physical, Spiritual and Social. Meanwhile, interns at Next Century created the beta version of the kiosk. FMA aims to install kiosks at prominent locations on post, such as the Post Exchange (PX) and Kimbrough Ambulatory Care Center, in the coming months.
“This is a wonderful, valuable resource and very easy to use,” said Lisa Terry, Manager of the Howard County Office of Veterans and Military Families, and a member of the FMA Military and Family Committee.
The information is organized easily so users will find needed resources and QR codes attached to those resources enabling them to simply capture information about each resource without any concerns about confidentiality, she said.
The kiosk will make needed services more readily available, including behavioral health services to address the stress placed on cyber warriors, other personnel and families, said Jennifer Crockett, Director of Behavioral Health Programs for Military Families at Kennedy Krieger and a member of the FMA Military and Family Committee. “There is also a major nutrition component in the kiosk because of the increase in obesity and the fast-paced lives that everyone leads which sometimes leads to not making the best food choices.”
“Hopefully people will be able to use this tool before they ever get to Fort Meade,” Terry said. “I was a military spouse once and by the time you get moved in, get your household goods, set up all of your utilities, get your kids enrolled in school and handle all the other logistics, three to six months could pass. But you really need to do some things faster,” like accessing medical services, lining up work for a military spouse, or arranging music lessons or another favorite activity that will give a military child something to look forward to in their new home.
