Illinois Corps Of Fire Chaplains, Inc (ICFC)

Welcome To ICFC

We are a not-for- profit 501(c)(3)  volunteer organization established
in 2008. The purpose of the Illinois Corps of Fire Chaplains, Inc is

- to serve Fire Service Chaplains,
- to support the ministry of fire and emergency response Chaplains,
- to assist fire service agencies in developing Chaplaincy programs in their agencies,
- to develop standards of practice in cooperation with emergency agencies,
- to develop a network designed to assist victims of fires, disasters and terrorism.
Download Icfcbrochure09

In partnership with MABAS we are reaching across the state of Illinois to provide an effective network of mutual aid, training and a standard of care in our departments and communities.  www.mabas.org

Sign up for updates by email to be automatically notified when new postings are available!

May God bless you as you serve!

Chaplain Jennie Swanson
Hanover Park Fire Department
ICFC President
jennieswanson@sbcglobal.net

ICFC Board Of Directors
Chaplain Jennie Swanson (Hanover Park) President
Chaplain Darrell Coons  (Belleville, East Side, Northwest, Swansea,
Mid America Airport, Saint Louis Downtown Airport) Vice President   
Chaplain Bob Moll (Barrington/Palatine Rural) Treasurer

MABAS Program Leadership Team Members

Chaplain Lee Gatzke  (Sauk Village/Steger)

Chaplain Roberta Preston (Colfax)
Chaplain Ed Hatcher (Chesterfield, MO)

Fire Chief Craig Haigh (Hanover Park)

Fire Chief Curt Kramer (Hampshire)

     

Administrative Headquarters
507 N. 43rd Street
Belleville, IL 62226-5317

Training Headquarters
Carol Stream FPD Station #3
1045 West Lies Road
Carol Stream, IL 60188

NFFF Taking Care of Our Own Training 3.29.10

March 29, 2010 - Monday   0900-1600

Hosted by Glenside FPD

1608 Bloomingdale Road

Glendale Heights, IL 60139  

(630)668-5323

Lunch and snacks provided

Pre-registration is required. Size is limited to 5O attendees. No Charge

Fire Departments don't know when they will have a line-of-duty death or serious injury.  

Do you have a plan in place? Do you know how to notify survivors in a timely and proper way? Are your personnel records current? Do you know how to access Federal, State and local benefits?

Targeted for senior fire officers, chaplains and Honor Guard commanders, this course covers pre-incident planning, survivor notification, family and coworker support, and benefits and resources available for survivors.

Download LODD Glenside3.29.10

FFC Chaplain and CISM Training

 Federation of Fire Chaplains
Great Lakes Regional
Fire Chaplains and CISM
Annual Training Institute

April 19-20, 2010

Wayne Township Fire Headquarters
700 North High School Road
Indianapolis, IN

Download FireTrainingInstBrochure

Salvation Army 2nd Request for Assistance

Salvation Army EDS CISM Trained personnel .  We are back on.

We have been asked to continue to provide Emotional and Spiritual Care trained personnel and Paula Sullivan is developing teams who are willing to work with the Haitian evacuees here in the Chicagoland area.

The shift hours are:

7:00 PM to 7:30 AM on Friday - 01/29 only!

7:00 AM to 3:30 PM Saturday, Sunday, and Monday
3:00 PM to 11:30 PM Saturday, Sunday, and Monday
11:00 PM to 7:30 AM Saturday, Sunday, and Monday - possible through Tuesday morning.

If you have received this message, you have the appropriate training and are eligible, but you must contact Paula at paula_sullivan@usc.salvationarmy.org for specific deployment details. You will also need to fill out SA volunteer paperwork on arrival if you have not already done so.

Please contact Paula at via email at paula_sullivan@usc.salvationarmy.org for additional details.

ICISF Haiti Deployments

Project Medishare

Request for ICISF CISM Trained Personnel

Dear Colleagues,

We are organizing a planned mental health support team for Haiti with the first deployment potentially scheduled for February 2, 2010 with rotations following thereafter. The mental health teams will be partnering with Project Medishare

http://www.projectmedishare.org/who-are-we/ 

a non-government organization that has been in Haiti since 1994 providing health and other much needed services.

Project Medishare staff will be our on the ground support and will be providing the lodging, sustenance, transportation, security, and translation for our team.  Mental health teams will provide support at Project Medishare's sites. The teams will be working with children and their caregivers so I am looking for a wide range of skills. Psychiatrists, psychiatric nurses, and other mental health professionals, and clergy. If you are NOT a mental health professional but have responded to a National disaster in the past, please provide me with your information. Deployment will be for 4-5 days.

What I am hoping to do is have enough people interested to be able to send people down in rotation with teams overlapping throughout for several weeks. I will also designate a lead person/coordinator for each team when I can't be there.  Project Medishare has private planes that have been donated for their use that leave from Miami daily to Haiti. We are currently working with airlines and other organizations to get team members to Miami. At this point we do not foresee a cost to the team member for transportation. If you know of other mental health professionals who have expressed an interest in deployment who have been trained in a disaster/crisis response model (ICISF-CISM, NOVA, or TLC) please forward this email to them.

Thanks.

For those wishing to GO TO Haiti to volunteer time/skills please e-mail:
 
1.  Full name
2.  Contact #
3.  Home address
4.  Date of birth
5.  E-mail address
6.  Languages spoken
7.  Title/ profession/degree
8.  Specialty/skills
9.  Country of citizenship
10. Passport # with exp date
11. Mental Health/Medical License #
12. Crisis response training/deployment history
13. Availability
14. ICISF Membership
15. ICISF Certificate Of Specialized Training (COST), preferred but  not required
16. Medishare is advising you should have a current Tetanus Shot and  Hepatitis “B” shot

Respectfully,

Samantha Madhosingh, Psy.D.
Project Medishare in Haiti

Your point of contact shall be:

Samantha Madhosingh, Psy.D.
madsamdoc@gmail.com

Utilize the above e-mail for inquires or to forward your information to be considered for this mission. All inquiries and questions are to be sent to directly to Dr. Madhosingh.

Please do not contact ICISF for any additional clarification of this request.

We at ICISF appreciate your willingness to use your ICISF training to serve those in need within the Haiti disaster, and thus supporting one of our partner agencies in this response. If selected, you will be responding with project Medishare. Please be advised that this deployment is not an ICISF deployment, and is solely under the auspices of Project Medishare.

For those looking for upcoming training opportunities offering various ICISF CISM Trainings, please view the following ICISF links:

ICISF Conference Calendar
http://www.icisf.org/training/calendarofcon.cfm

ICISF Conference Brochure
January – June, 2010
http://www.icisf.org/training/2010JanuaryJune.pdf

Regional Conference Schedule 2010
http://www.icisf.org/training/12.8.09.pdf

Approved Instructor Workshops
http://www.icisf.org/training/calendarOfTrain.asp

Donald R. Howell
Executive Director
International Critical Incident Stress Foundation, Inc.
3290 Pine Orchard Lane, Unit 106
Ellicott City, MD 21042-2272
http://www.icisf.org
dhowell@icisf.org
410-750-9600
Fax: 410-750-9601

Upcoming Trainings for February and March 2010

ICFC/MABAS

Division 12 Chaplain Trainings

February and March 2010

 

 

We have several valuable training opportunities for you these next couple of months.  These are excellent trainings for rookies and experienced chaplains alike. Company officers and Chiefs welcome and encouraged to attend.  We hope you will be able to participate!  Even more opportunities are posted on the www.ilfirechaplains.org website.

 

Regular Monthly Trainings:

1. Fire Ground Basics and Chaplain Safety

Thursday February 11, 2010    0900-1130

Chaplain Training Headquarters
1045 West Lies Road, Carol Stream

Taught by Fire Chief Craig Haigh, Hanover Park

 

2. Hands on Fire Training and Live Burn
   Thursday March 11, 2010       0900-1200 with lunch following class $8
   Bring your own bunker gear and SCBA if you have it. Choose from:
   Level 1: Basic fire behavior, ladder truck operations
   Level 2: SCBA maze in light smoke conditions
   Level 3: Live burn in tower

Carol Stream Station #1
365 Kuhn Road, Carol Stream
Taught by shift personnel (registration requested by March 1, 2010- guru4x@aol.com)

 

3.      Federation of Fire Chaplains BASIC course
This class is a part of the basic recommended requirements for the ICFC and a foundational experience for our chaplains. We will also hold our ICFC annual meeting on the evening of the first day.

Friday-Saturday   February 19th and 20^th, 2010


American Red Cross Headquarters
1 Westport Ct   Bloomington, IL 61704 

The FFC Basic chaplain course is a two day, 16 hour class that covers the following topics:  Ministry to Firefighters, Ministry to Fire Victims, Critical Incident Stress, Fire Department Funerals, Fire Chaplain Operations, and many others.

Certification as an FFC Fire Chaplain is offered on completion of the course.

Costs and Registration forms here http://www.ilfirechaplains.org/2009/12/ffc-basic-chaplain-central-il-training-announcement.html

 

PLEASE SUPPORT THE ICFC BY RENEWING YOUR MEMBERSHIP FOR 2010. 

http://www.ilfirechaplains.org/2009/12/icfc-annual-membership-renewal.html

Salvation Army Request For Assistance

1/28/10    WE ARE BACK ON.  Got to http://www.ilfirechaplains.org/2010/01/salvation-army-2nd-request-for-assistance.html for more information.   1/27/10 UPDATE: United Airlines will not be running any more flights from Haiti to Chicago at this time.  If you are interested in being available for future deployments, please contact the Salvation Army at the number below. The Salvation Army has requested ICFC Chaplain assistance with the Haitian evacuees who will be arriving in Chicago over the next month (until the third week of February).  They are seeking our help with the evacuees who will be staying in shelters in Chicago while awaiting tranport to thier final destinations in the US.  These are documented persons who already have some ties with the US.  However, they have to start their lives over, and this is a very difficult time in thier lives.  As a result of their trauma many are experiencing symptoms of acute stress reaction and we have been asked to help them by providing emotional and spiritual care. If you are trained by ICFC, FFC or SA, are certified as a Chaplain and are interested in volunteering the contact information is below.  We are looking for people with CISM training and affiliation with the ICFC to help.  The shifts will be 8 hours per day, with 24 hour coverage, as follows:  0700-1530, 1530-2300 and 2300-0700. Thank you for your help in being willing to volunteer.  Prayers are needed and appreciated.

Please contact Operations Chief Paula Sullivan at 847-489-8654

FFC Southeastern Region Training

The Federation of Fire Chaplains (FFC) is organized by Regions.  The Southeast Region just posted its 2010 Training Schedule. 

For more information on any of the courses below please contact

Chaplain Paul Trumpore
FFC Southeast Region Director
PNTrumpore@aol.com

Classes for the Southeast Region in 2010 include:

04-06 Jan
Individual and Group Crisis Intervention in Jackson

19-20 Feb - awaiting final confirmation
Essentials of Emergency Service Chaplaincy (Basic Chaplain Academy) at Alabama Fire College in Tuscaloosa

06-07 Mar
Essentials of Emergency Service Chaplaincy (Basic Chaplain Academy) at Smoky Mountain Weekend (a statewide fire service training event in East TN)

06-07 Mar
Advanced Communications - Preparing For Disaster (Amateur Radio Technician) class at Smoky Mountain Weekend (a statewide fire service training event in East TN)

18-20 Mar
Individual and Group Crisis
Intervention class at TN Fire Academy

08-09 Apr
CISM for Families in Nashville, TN

July - possible class - not confirmed
Essentials of Fire Chaplaincy class in Lincolnton, NC

09-10 Aug
Advanced CISM at TN Fire Academy

11-12 Aug
Suicide Prevention, Intervention, and Post-vention at TN Fire Academy

11-12 Aug
Essentials of Emergency Service Chaplaincy (Basic Chaplain Academy) at TN Fire Academy

13-14 Aug
Line-of-Duty Death Incident Response Course for Chaplains at TN Fire Academy

15-21 Oct
Bus Trip to Federation of Fire Chaplains Annual Training Conference near Cincinnati. OH

04-05 Nov (date not yet confirmed)
Course TBA for Region-2 EMS Directors Conference in Gatlinburg

Possible one-day mini-conference in Walthoursville, GA for Spring/Summer 2010.

ICISF Changing Face of Crisis Course (MO)

Changing Face of Crisis & Disaster Mental Health Intervention: Competency-Based Update– NEW

Saturday, February 6th
0800-1900

WINTER FIRE SCHOOL
Columbia, MO

Instructor: Ed Hatcher

Chaplain Ed Hatcher is a retired Air Force chaplain with more than 30 years of pastoral experience. He specializes in crisis and trauma ministry, being an Association of Traumatic Stress Specialists Certified Trauma Responder and an American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress certified expert in both Acute and Traumatic Stress. He is an approved instructor for more than 15 different International Critical Incident Stress Foundation courses and holds all ICISF Certificates of Specialized Training. A lifetime member of the National Organization for Victim Assistance, he also teaches courses in Psychological First Aid and Clergy Sexual Assault Response. Chaplain Ed Hatcher is vice-president of the Missouri Fire Chaplain Corps and an instructor for the Federation of Fire Chaplains. Chaplain Hatcher is also active in addressing the concerns of returning veterans and their families and is a student in a clinical counseling program at Capella University.

The purpose of this workshop is to provide participants with an integrated synopsis of program innovations, consensus reviews, and research findings relevant to crisis and disaster mental health intervention. As the ICISF curriculum has undergone significant changes in the last 12 months, this workshop is offered as a “one stop shopping” opportunity to gain the latest information on issues and changes that are essential to the domains of critical incident stress management, crisis and disaster response. This is a competency-based workshop that will serve to satisfy ICISF requirements for ICISF Trained Trainers and those seeking Certificates of Advanced Training. This workshop is intended for anyone who has an interest in crisis and disaster mental health intervention.

To register- go to:

http://www.mufrti.org/winterfs10/register.shtml

 

Counseling Services for Fire Fighters, LLC Training

Hi all: 

Battaion Chief Jeff Dill (Palatine Rural FPD) is hosting two trainings that you might be interested in.  The first is intended for fire officers (or those chaplains with FD experience) and a second will be held in February for counselors/chaplains interested in working with fire fighters who are new to the fire service. Call or email Jeff for info on the February training date and location.  

 

The ICFC is interested in working with B/C Dill to enhance our training in the work we do. Working with Jeff will give us access to professional consultation as we develop our materials, new courses and the printed resources that we offer to fire departments and chaplains alike. Together we are also working with the Everyone Goes Home program to effectively address Initiative #13 and toward the development of teaching resources that can be used with that program.

Jennie

 

 

After Hurricane Katrina I decided to go back to school for my Master's Degree in Counseling.  I saw a need to develop a relationship between clinicians and the fire service.  In doing so I developed workshops that address several needs with one being a workshop directed towards fire officers.  This is a four-hour, hands-on, interactive role play class, in which fire officers will gain insight as to behavioral issues of firefighters, how to recognize signs and symptoms, how to help struggling firefighters and direct them to the appropriate care.

 

I have revised my costs for these workshops due to the economy so I am offering this course titled, An Internal Size-Up  for $30 per person. 

 

Please see the attachment for further details.  I am also leading a PTSD group for firefighters at my intern site at McHenry Family Services in McHenry, IL.  Additional information can be found on our web site at www.csff.info.

 

Download Seniorofficerworkshopandregistrationform

Regards,

Jeff Dill
Founder
Counseling Services for Fire Fighters, LLC
P.O. Box 1141
Woodstock, IL 60098
Office: 815-308-5082
Mobile: 847-209-8208
jeff@csff.info

Another year has nearly passed and I find myself looking back proudly on the accomplishments of the Illinois Corps of Fire Chaplains. While our organization has experienced growth and success, the road has not been smooth all the way for its members.  Many of us have experienced losses and difficulties this past year.  Some were financial and some were about family.  We have been intentional about seeking God’s help first and then being that help for one another.  We have also seen joy – in the faces of those we serve, in a job well done, in knowing that we indeed make a difference. I know that I have grown as a person, as a Chaplain and in the many roles I play in my family’s life.  I thank you for the help and support you have given me personally over the past year as well.

 

I believe that our Corps has established itself firmly in its mission to serve. We have drawn together; focused on the goals we have set and built upon the strengths we have. We have built 23 new programs in Illinois since we began this organization in 2008, enrolled 60 chaplains as members of the organization, and supported the efforts of many more.  Our new training headquarters in Carol Stream is a now place to call home, though the bulk of the work is a joint effort from chaplains across the state. We have participated in numerous disaster drills in the Chicago Metro area, provided mutual aid for a Chaplain response in Michigan, assisted the Salvation Army with flood response, post Katrina recovery, Burr Oak Cemetery and H1N1 vaccine distribution.  Hundreds if not thousands of hours of care and service have been offered to our departments and communities at fires, deaths, trainings and intentional time spent at the station. 

 

We have prayed together, laughed together, trained together and set the bar high.  I wonder, though, where we want to be next year, in three years or even in five years.  I would like to challenge you as you start the New Year to think about that. What is God calling us to do?  What horizons are in front of you as we come into 2010?  How can we step forward on that journey together?

 

Let me also express my thanks to all of you for your leadership, your thirst for knowledge, your willingness to train, your faith and your prayerful tenacity.  In the midst of adversity, you do not waiver.  In the face of loss, you have clung to hope.  As the doors of opportunity and change open, we have stepped through together.   Good job ICFC.  Well done team.  Special thanks to our Board of Directors and all those whose support and encouragement puts wind in our sails.  You should be proud of yourselves.

 

I’d like to close with a quote that I heard at training session sometime this year – though I can’t remember who said it or when.  It has stuck with me none the less.  “Every day is currency to be spent.”  How rich we are if we look at it that way.  The time, talents and very breath we have are ours to enjoy and to give away.  I know that you will. 

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and God’s blessing to you always.

 

Be safe and at peace.

Jennie Swanson
President