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Getting the
word out
Today, WYS has locations
throughout Orange County,
which include: outreach and
engagement facilities, Me-
di-Cal outpatient clinics, family
resource centers, and on-site
school-based services. The
organization also offers addi-
tional services at additional lo-
cations through their collabo-
rative partnerships, in order to
provide an integrated approach
to mental health care.
With this range of services, WYS
makes an extraordinary im-
pact on children and youth in
Orange County. This past year,
they estimated their impact at
over 55,000 clients and fam-
ilies, with over 17,000 served
directly, and over 38,000 served
indirectly.
WYS aims to keep growing
those numbers because the
need is still so high. For the last
several years, Lorry says the or-
ganization has been in “growth
mode.”
“Every year, we’ve been grow-
ing our programs, and serving
more and more people in the
community,” she says. “In the
last three years alone, we’ve
grown something like 43 per
cent.”
Much of that growth, Lorry reit-
erates, has been in their service
offering for kids and families
that are not yet in crisis. WYS
has put a lot of time and effort
into finding and developing
programs and evidence-based
treatments that prevent mental
health disorders from devel-
oping, and prevent crises from
happening in the first place.
As an important part of that ef-
fort, WYS has made it a priority
to educate parents, teachers,
Boys and Girls Clubs, as well as
any other youth-serving organi-
zations they can find. In partic-
ular, they are instructing them
on Adverse Childhood Experi-
ences (ACEs), and the proven
link they have to mental health
conditions.
“When kids are exposed to
abuse, neglect or family dys-
function at a young age it im-
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