In September 2017, the Community Foundation of Dunn County provided a grant of nearly $5,000 to the Dunn County Dementia Coalition to hire a coordinator to recruit and train an additional six trainers to offer dynamic and informative dementia friendly community training.
The Coalition spent much of 2018 putting those dollars to use, developing multiple classroom-style PowerPoint presentations that are readily available to provide critical and sensitive information to any of the trainers, most of whom are community members. The presentations created a platform for these trainers to share their experiences and knowledge to their audiences, which included transportation companies, banks, private businesses and churches.
ADRC Intern Kelly Bien prepares for the Virtual Dementia Tour experience, held in March 2018.
The initial training group grew from six trainers to 10 trainers by September 2018, and another three volunteers became trainers by September 2018. These trainers can provide the community with approximately 25 dementia-friendly training sessions annually.
During last year’s training process, the Coalition determined that there is much continued support and public interest in understanding dementia in our community. The 10 trainers provided dementia-friendly information to 16 Dunn County organizations, which translated to 365 community members. These efforts helped properly equip an array of community members, including nurses, bank tellers, volunteer drivers, church members and others how to sensitively support those in the community with memory loss.
One of the earlier training sessions this grant helped fund was the Remember Project, a heartfelt 12-scene play titled “Steering into the Skid”, which depicts a couple struggling with the early stages dementia. The performance was held on October 7, 2017 at the Dunn County Community Services Building and around 125 people attended and participated in a community conversations session following the play.
And, in March 2018, the Coalition held a training session called the Virtual Dementia Tour, where 45 individuals attended and had their senses altered to gain empathy to those struggling with memory loss.
Overall during the October 2017- July 2018 grant cycle, 535 Dunn County Community members received tips and information about dementia and its impact on individuals and family.