Dear Friends,
It is with sadness, gratitude and excitement that I announce my impending departure as Executive Director of Hephzibah. My transition will take place in the spring of this year when my family and I relocate to pursue new adventures and our desire for small town life. It has been an honor to serve Hephzibah for the past seven years.
When I first joined this amazing organization, it was an exciting time for me, but was also a time when the need for our services was increasing. Children were suffering from abuse and neglect at alarming rates, and families were increasingly feeling the stresses of an ever-changing economy and at risk of fracturing more than ever. We immediately got to work growing and developing services to meet the need in our community and we have helped record numbers of children and families with innovative new therapies for children at Hephzibah Home and licensed more foster parents than ever before.
Hephzibah has transformed its programming focusing on the expansion of our prevention services in order to stabilize families and keep them together. We renovated Hephzibah Home to provide enhanced therapeutic care to children and transformed the programming into a single residential treatment home using an integrated model of care that can adapt to each child’s individual needs. We also adapted our Day Care program to accommodate our families during the pandemic, expanded our services to support more working families, and added reading and math tutoring services. We have created more community and agency partnerships to help families than ever before, including those who are facing homelessness and those who may need to access specialty therapies.
I am proud to have been a part of Hephzibah’s enduring legacy and there is no doubt in my mind that Hephzibah will continue to innovate, expand and grow for many, many years to come. The strength of this organization lies in the hands and hearts of the children and families who bravely come to us to heal and grow, the staff who dedicate themselves to this work and our mission, and all of our incredible supporters who make each program possible.
In the coming months, the Hephzibah Board of Directors will search for the next leader, who will no doubt carry the mission and vision of Hephzibah forward and accomplish great things. I would like to deeply thank everyone who helped make my tenure at Hephzibah the most rewarding and cherished experience of my career. I will be forever grateful for my experiences, all that I have learned, and for those I have met during my time with Hephzibah.
Yours in Service and Gratitude,
Merry Beth