Come Celebrate Children’s Heart in Art

Sarno da Costa D’Aniello Maceri LLC Partner, Stacey Cozewith, Esq., is a trustee of the Children’s Hope Initiative (CHI), a non-profit corporation affiliated with the Friends of Somerset County Youth. CHI’s mission is “to meet the unmet needs of abused or neglected children and their families by providing resources for existing organizations in Somerset County.” CHI fulfills its mission in many ways. One of the ways in which CHI fulfilled its mission in 2013 was by funding the Creative Heartwork program.

The program provides art therapy to abused and neglected children. The goal of the program is “to improve the lives of children experiencing the painful challenges of serious illness, disability, separation, poverty, abuse or neglect by providing healing programs utilizing the visual arts, music, dance and theater, media and culinary arts or other creative opportunities to provide the opportunity for children to reframe their experiences, channel their emotions, enhance resiliency, experience pride in their healthy adjustment to circumstances beyond their control.” The art therapy provided by this program allows children to utilize creative outlets as a constructive way to heal from the trauma associated with abuse or neglect that they experienced in the past.

In 2013, Creative Heartwork helped 106 children who were victims of abuse or neglect. Now, to celebrate the progress of those children, the artwork that they created will be on display on Tuesday, March 11, 2014 through April 11, 2014 at the County Administration Building on Grove Street in Somerville. If you are in the area, make sure to stop by and see the amazing art that these children have created and support them in their continuous healing process.

Programs like Creative Heartwork are essential to not only help individual children, but also to help end the cycle of violence. We applaud and thank Stacey and the other members of CHI for their endless efforts to help abused and neglected children heal.