KEEP collaborates with families to create sustainable change and safety in the home.

KEEP Program Mission: To assist families in working toward a safe and stable home, equipped with the necessary tools for immediate and future use

KEEP stands for Key Essential Elements of Permanency and is a removal prevention and reunification program.

KEEP is a Removal Prevention, Reunification, Kinship, & Teen Program that works with clients in specific counties to address safety, stability, and family dynamics within the home. We work to provide families with tools for future use and link with community resources.

Maple Star has provided these services through the KEEP program since October 1, 2012.  Maple Star created and implemented this program to assist families and officials of participating counties and states in achieving and maintaining stability in the home and creating permanency for the related children.

Through an emphasis on family engagement, the KEEP program focuses on family strengths in an effort to identify their challenges, engage the families in the process, and work to create self-sufficiency. The success of the program rests on this premise and is further enhanced by the availability of the KEEP staff as well as the creativity they provide in responding to a family’s needs.  A strength of the KEEP program is the ability to work with families in their home communities which defuses resistance and creates alignment and follow through on the part of the family.

The KEEP program is not portrayed as part of the system trying to control the family’s behaviors. It is a strengths-based program that works in collaboration with the family.

The KEEP program’s success is due to the following strategies that are included in all interventions.

  • Removal Prevention: Offers up to 50 hours of direct client contact to span 2 weeks or 30 days to help mitigate safety concerns that may lead to removal of the children, and maintain stability in the home for the youth and their family.
  • Reunification: Offers up to 50 hours of direct client contact to span 30-60 days to assist youth and the respective families with needs and concerns specific to maintaining the safety and stability in the home
  • Kinship: utilizes the KEEP reunification model and offers up to 90 days of support in the home , including psycho-educational groups for caregivers
  • Teen: utilizes the KEEP model and specializes in working with adolescents and their family up to 120 days, with the goal of mitigating the need for congregate care 

Goals of KEEP

  • Secure safety in the home
  • Help families satisfy immediate needs of the household
  • Link families to essential community resources
  • Communicate with related counties in the interest of the families