Children’s Home of Ohio has achieved reaccreditation
Christian Children’s Home of Ohio has achieved national reaccreditation through the New York-based Council on Accreditation.
Christian Children’s Home of Ohio has achieved national reaccreditation through the New York-based Council on Accreditation. For nearly 50 years CCHO’s children’s residential center has provided a safe, structured environment to meet the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual needs of abused and neglected children age 6-18 from all across Ohio.
Through its extended family of ministries, foster-care services, community mental-health counseling, intensive trauma therapy and equine-assisted therapy also are available.
COA accreditation is an objective, independent and reliable validation of an agency’s performance. The COA accreditation process involves a detailed review and analysis of an organization’s administration, management and service-delivery functions against international standards of best practice.
The standards driving accreditation ensure services are well-coordinated, culturally competent, evidence-based, outcome-oriented, and provided by a skilled and supported workforce. COA accreditation demonstrates accountability in the management of resources, sets standardized best practice thresholds for service and administration, and increases organizational capacity and accountability by creating a framework for ongoing quality improvement.
To achieve COA accreditation, CCHO first provided written evidence of compliance with the COA standards. Thereafter a group of specially trained volunteer peer reviewers confirmed adherence to these standards during a series of onsite interviews with trustees, staff and clients. Based on their findings, COA’s volunteer-based accreditation commission determined CCHO had successfully met the criteria for accreditation. Accreditation was achieved within 16 months.
CCHO President and CEO Kevin Hewitt said, “We are so pleased to be affirmed by COA as we head into the celebration of our 50th anniversary year in 2019. Led by our continuous quality improvement team, CCHO actively engages staff members in reviewing and refining policies and procedures so we can realize our vision to be the partner of choice, providing services that transform lives, families and communities.”
An endorsement of COA and the value of its accreditation process is reflected in it being named by the U.S. State Department as the sole national independent accrediting body under the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption to accredit intercountry adoption service providers. Founded in 1977, COA is an independent nonprofit accreditor of the full continuum of community-based behavioral health care and social-service organizations in the United States and Canada.
Over 2,000 organizations — voluntary, public and proprietary; local and statewide; and large and small — have either successfully achieved COA accreditation or are currently engaged in the process. Presently COA has a total of 47 service standards that are applicable to over 125 different types of programs.
To learn more about COA, visit www.coanet.org.