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Organization Profile
The Kennedy Center, Inc. is a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization
that provides extensive personalized educational, vocational, rehabilitative,
recreational and residential services to persons with disabilities
and special needs.
Established originally in 1951 by Evelyn Kennedy and a dozen other
parents from Bridgeport, Connecticut to provide education and recreation
for their children with mental retardation, The Kennedy Center now
serves persons with a variety of disabilities and special needs
from birth through their senior years.
The Kennedy Center has won a number of national awards and has
been given perfect ratings by the national standards setting organization,
CARF (The Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities),
in both 1999 and 2002, placing our organization in the top 1% in
the country and the only facility in Connecticut to ever receive
a perfect rating.
Today we have 480 employees and 350 volunteers who are the backbone
of our efficient and much needed delivery system of programs and
services to over 1000 people daily.
In addition to mental retardation, we work with speech, vision,
hearing, and other physical impairments, neurological, psychological
and mental health difficulties including acquired brain injury,
autism, schizophrenia and cerebral palsy. These are all special
needs that are met in programs and services that The Kennedy Center
provides.
We operate 13 group residential sites in many different communities
in Connecticut and our Travel Training services help to teach persons
with disabilities to use a variety of transportation modes (especially
all types of public transit) throughout Connecticut, the Metro Boston
area, and in all the boroughs of New York City.
The Kennedy Center runs an after-school program and a summer fulltime
program for children in the Greater Bridgeport area. This is accomplished
in partnership with the Bridgeport Board of Education, the federal
21st Century grant project and The Lighthouse project.
The Children’s Services department also operates Birth-to-Three,
Parent Aide, pre-school learning centers, FAST (foster care and
adoptive parent support and training), and other early intervention
programs.
In addition, Kennedy Industries operates six small businesses and,
in conjunction with our many private business partners, we have
created hundreds of opportunities in supported and competitive employment
for our consumers.
Our school-to-career trainings and the work of our job coaches
and job placement staff have been a great asset for the high schools
and businesses in several areas of Connecticut.
The Kennedy Center
CELEBRATING & EMPOWERING THE POTENTIAL OF ALL
PEOPLE
Since 1951
A United Way Agency
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