At Missouri Baptist Children’s Home, we’ve seen hope turn from a vague idea into the concrete reality of total life change. When Jesus takes charge of broken stories, despair crumbles into dust as children find homes, youth find direction, parents find resources, and families find a future.
Here’s just a glimpse of the work MBCH does to invest in Missouri families:
Preventive Services
Pregnancy In-Home Services and Home Visitation Services:
We partner with Lutheran Family and Children’s Services in St. Louis, Southeast Missouri, and Kansas City to provide in-home services to pregnant women and their families. We utilize a curriculum that is designed to support parents in raising their children in a safe, nurturing environment. Our goal is to help break cycles of abuse/neglect as well as support in helping families who are living in impoverished situations.
Drop-In Center for Teens:
We provide a center at our Lowe-Frillman Campus to assist unhoused teens with everyday living needs such as a place to shower, to do laundry, to eat and just to “hang out.” We also assist these teens and their families with resources needed to find housing. Our goal is to assist teens and their families to stay together and out of the child welfare system whenever possible.
Stronger Family Services (SFS):
This is our newest program coming in the Spring of 2025! This program will provide time-limited support (up to 90 days) and services to children and families in the St. Louis area that are experiencing factors or situations that put them at risk for separation. A range of preventive services, from further upstream family preservation and stabilization to more intensive family preservation services can be provided by the SFS program.
Foster Care Services
Foster care services are provided to assist in helping children/youth who are in state custody due to abuse/neglect.
Family Foster Care:
MBCH partners with Missouri Alliance for Children and Families as well as KVC through the Foster Care Case Management Contract to provide case managers who work to find permanency for children/youth in state custody. Permanency can occur by children/youth being reunified with their parents or through guardianship or adoption by a relative or someone else who has a connection/relationship with the child/youth. We provide this service in St. Louis, Springfield, and Joplin.
Treatment Family care:
Treatment Relative Providers or Treatment Foster Parents provide care to children/youth with moderate to severe trauma to help stabilize them and prepare them for permanency. Treatment Family Care Specialists provide 24/7 assistance. We provide this services in St. Louis, Springfield, Joplin, and Kansas City.
Family Resource Development:
MBCH recruits and trains relative providers and foster parents to care for children/youth in
state custody. Once the family is licensed Family Resource Development Specialists provide support for the family. We provide this service in St. Louis, Springfield, Joplin, and Kansas City.
Transitional Living Scattered Sites Apartments:
MBCH Children and Family Ministries provides furnished apartments in the community for young men and women. The youth live on their own, where they apply the skills they have learned. We provide this service in St. Louis and Springfield.
The youth have regular contact with an off-site case manager who helps them continue to learn and practice life skills such as:
- Money management
- Maintaining a job
- Daily living skills
- Relationship skills
- Self-support
They are given the opportunity to experience life just as they will when they become adults. The TLP Scattered Site program provides the ability to learn and succeed with a safety net.
Residential Services
MBCH provides residential short-term placements that promote growth, positive change, and ultimately, a move toward permanency for children/youth. The one exception to this is our IDD program (services to Intellectually & Developmentally Disabled Adults). This program focuses on providing a more long-term living situation.
Anti-Trafficking Services:
Sexual trafficking profits from enslaving people for sexual servitude. Our primary focus is to serve female minors who have been or are at high risk of being sexually trafficked. We provide a safe group home environment along with therapy and a treatment plan to eventually find permanence. We provide this service in the Kansas City area.
If you are currently experiencing sexual trafficking or you know someone who is, please call 1-800-264-6224 for assistance. You can also visit the National Human Trafficking Resource Center website for more information: https://traffickingresourcecenter.org/
The National Human Trafficking Hotline is: 1-888-373-7888 or text “HELP” to 233733.
Transitional Living Program and Transitional Living Program/Pregnancy Services:
With little or no family support system, young people who are aging out of the foster care system are at significant risk of failing to become independent, successful adults. The MBCH Children and Family Ministries Transitional Living Program (TLP) provides the opportunity for young people between the ages of 16-21 to transition out of residential care or foster care into independence.
In addition to the TLP programs MBCH provides at the Lowe-Frillman Campus in St. Louis and the Hutchens Campus in Mt. Vernon, there is also a TLP Pregnancy Services program at the Lowe-Frillman Campus in St. Louis which is for young ladies between the ages of 16-21 who are pregnant or have young children (up to age 2). These clients receive services to help them plan for their children in addition to receiving the services described below.
To give these youth the best possible chance to succeed in life, we provide training programs to develop independent living skills necessary for these youth to live on their own. The goal is to teach self-sufficiency through education, employment, and good decision-making. MBCH Children and Family Ministries also recognize that while these youth need to develop independent living skills, they also need family support. We assist them by either helping them reconnect to their biological family (when appropriate) or finding those who can function as a family for them.
Therapeutic Group Home Services:
MBCH serves minor females in this program at its Hutchens Campus in Mt. Vernon. Therapeutic Group Homes provides a structured, safe short-term environment for girls who are unable (due to trauma) to live in a family setting. Staff assist clients in healing through treatment such as individual therapy, groups, and spiritual help. The goal is to assist them in finding permanency or moving towards permanency.
Services to Intellectually & Developmentally Disabled Adults:
Through two group homes, one in Peculiar called Country Haven, and one in Springfield called The Branches at Brookline, intellectually and developmentally disabled adults are served. Because MBCH respects the right of the IDD adult to be as autonomous and as independent as possible, striking a healthy balance between independence and supported group living is of paramount importance.
Counseling Center
Our licensed therapists care for children, youth, and community clients in need of empathy, understanding, and direction.
Church Engagement Services
Church Engagement seeks to create and provide opportunities for people of faith to connect with the children and families served by MBCH.
We encourage churches to take advantage of relational connection opportunities to serve local children and families. As churches serve the least of these in their local area, it provides missional and discipleship opportunities for their church, and it offers compassionate love and care to children and families in crisis.
As children and families connect with natural helpers through a church in their local community, and as they connect in relationships with people of faith, they are exposed to the gospel and they have supportive friendships that last long after our other program services of MBCH have ended.
To learn more and see how your church might get engaged and serve children and families alongside MBCH, just click the Get Involved tab and select Church Engagement from the drop down menu.
