Amy M. Bishop, MSW
Education Stability Consultant: Advocating for families with youth ages 3-18 to overcome barriers, improve school age educational outcomes and plan for college
Author of “Educational Planning of Court-Involved Youth: A Guide for Counties, Systems, and Individuals” (2018)
After working in the field of educational advocacy for 15 years, Amy Bishop, branched out as an Educational Stability Consultant and created a educational planning framework to help county systems more effectively collaborate to greatly improve educational outcomes for youth in the judicial and child welfare systems. Educational aptitude and graduation rates continue to decline for Colorado youth who encounter the court and foster care systems. Unfortunately, the decline in education and graduation is directly proportional to the barriers these youth face when returning to the home community after system involvement, which unnecessarily promotes recidivism. However, at the core of this issue is a prime opportunity for change that has proven effective for Douglas County Human Services and 17th Judicial District in Colorado. The change that is necessary to ensure Colorado's youth have access to a brighter future is rooted in a collaborate approach to intervention in each community. Fortunately, this can be accomplished according to the needs in each community and utilizing existing resources.
As a result, Amy has developed an educational guide three tier framework to further guide county agencies, schools and individuals in collaborating towards improved educational outcomes for court involved youth. For more information regarding this guided framework click Learn More below.
Amy also works directly with families and youth to overcome educational barriers, navigate the general and special education system, find alternative programs, utilize community resources to keep a youth on track towards educational success. She specializes in General and Special Education ages 5-17 and college planning beginning in high school.
Visit Contact page to set up a consultation, or use the contact form at the bottom of this page to inquire whether services are right for your County agency.
BOOK IS AVAILABLE ON AMAZON, BARNES & NOBLE, AND THE ROUTLEDGE WEBSITE:
https://www.amazon.com/Educational-Planning-Court-Involved-Youth-Individuals/dp/1138313831/ref=olp_product_details?_encoding=UTF8&me=
https://www.routledge.com/Educational-Planning-of-Court-Involved-Youth-A-Guide-for-Counties-Systems/Bishop/p/book/9781138313842
Areas of Practice
Workshops
Interactive workshops provide participants with the laws, knowledge, tools, and skills for advocating for youth at any age in their educational journey. Workshops include tools for transitions planning, educational case planning, skills working with at risk youth, special and general educational, discipline policies, and provide audience with case scenarios. Participants leave with documents and tools to use in the field with clients.
multi day training
Multi day trainings involve coordinating Education Action Teams in your counties, streamlining actions for change, creating an action plan and proceeding to implement change within agencies to ensure educational planning is on the forefront of a case the moment a youth comes in contact with the court system.
consultation & DIRECT SERVICES
Consultation includes working with counties individually to provide in person consultation services for your team. Every county has different needs and I work to specialize the consultation to the county. This includes assessing county needs, strengths, weaknesses, barriers, creating an action team and next steps in determining the level of consultation services needed to improve educational outcomes for all youth.
Direct service includes working with youth and families one on one to achieve educational success. See "Family Services" page for a more in depth description.
“Education may not be the only thing that helps ensure that people succeed in this world, but it is most certainly the start to becoming something better than we are.”
Let's Chat.
Use the form below to contact Amy regarding family direct services, trainings, and consultation. Please be as detailed as possible. If you are seeking direct educational advocacy for youth, included a description of need. If you are an organization, include your specific agency and those with which you wish to collaborate. You may also email or call me to make an appointment to discuss how we can work together to best improve educational outcomes unique to your need.