FOCUS Adult Day Program

Welcome to our FOCUS Adult Day Group page!

FOCUS helps adult participants maximize independence by teaching essential life skills in a recreational setting. Activities include cooking, fitness, art, volunteering, music therapy, and vocational training. The program focuses on increasing independence, community integration, and lifelong wellness, with tailored activities that develop motor skills, communication, cognition, social skills, and emotional control.  Staff engage with participants to understand their interests and needs, ensuring activities are both challenging and achievable.

Key Program Components:

• Art

FOCUS participants receive art instruction from skilled professionals within the community. Participants work with watercolors, clay, leather, beads, fiber, and other mediums to create works of self-expression. Additionally, they receive therapeutic benefits of expression through music therapy sessions and specific instrument lessons.

• Job Skills

FOCUS participants gain job skills through the production and sale of products at two local consignment retail stores. They work to learn how to utilize a Cricut maker machine, sublimation printer, and heat press. By learning how to utilize these tools, they are able to design and create items such as custom garden flags, chapstick holders, keychains, ceramic car coasters, seasonal candy holders, and more! FOCUS participants have been using original works of art and reproducing their work on multiple items.

• Cooking

FOCUS receives direct instruction from a professional chef each month. During this instruction, participants are also utilizing a professional teaching kitchen and tools to cook meals and bake desserts. FOCUS staff members then work with participants to modify recipes and use adaptive kitchen tools to make meals more independently in the HISRA kitchen.

• Fitness

FOCUS prioritizes a healthy life with the focus on life-long wellness. Participants receive private training with a certified trainer at the Riverplex weekly and bi-weekly sports instruction from a community instructor. Additionally, they receive bi-weekly fitness instruction from HISRA’s sports and wellness coordinator.

• Community Integration

The majority of FOCUS’s time is spent in the community. FOCUS participants attend local sporting events, theater performances, music concerts, and local festivals. They spend time volunteering within the community at local agencies such as each of the HISRA member districts, Easter Seals, and Midwest Food Bank.

Click here to view eligibility guidelines and operation details