Rosalynn Bliss
At first glance Rosalynn Bliss is a fairly unassuming woman. Petite and well dressed, she bustles into the tiny conference room beaming and a bit out of breath. She admits that as busy as she is, it’s her choice to be so, admitting that she enjoys being busy. Bliss is a Michigan State University alumnus. Involved in her chosen field for eleven years, she graduated with her Bachelor’s Degree in psychology and criminal justice and a Masters Degree in social work in addition to having her certification as a trauma and loss consultant and being a licensed social worker.
She began her involvement with the Children’s Assessment Center in 1998 as an intern with the DeVos Children’s Hospital’s Child Protection Team while working on her graduate degree from MSU. At the time, the Child Protection Team worked with the Center to provide after-hours emergency services for sexually-abused children. After graduating, Bliss was offered a full-time position with the Child Protection Team where she began to work even more closely with the Center, doing medical assessments after hours.
The medical unit Bliss worked at in those first years is located beneath the Children’s Assessment Center’s main building. When a child has been abused time is of the essence. If the Center receives a report of abuse within seventy-two hours after the abuse, they respond with an emergency medical exam. The Center also sees children who need a nonemergency exam after they have been sexually abused. Each doctor is paired with a nurse and a social worker, who does a pre-examination assessment of the child and the history of abuse, which was Bliss’ primary job at the Center.
The model for the Children’s Assessment Center is to make the experience as child friendly as possible. Before the Center, sexually-abused children were interviewed by the police in an emergency room, hospital, or even the sheriff’s department, which could be frightening for a young child. The intent of the Center is to bring all of the professionals to one, child-friendly place. The child goes to the Center, where staff responds to the child in one place where it is more comfortable for the child. The intent is to make it safe and less traumatic. “You want to start the healing process as soon as possible, and a big part of that is how you immediately respond,” Bliss says.
In late 2005 Bliss left her work at the children’s hospital to work as the director of both residential and emergency shelter programs at St. John’s Home, which works as an intermediary between removal of abused or neglected children from their homes and their assignment to foster homes. The neglected kids live at one of St. John’s four residential treatment centers from six months to two years. In 2007 Bliss was asked to serve on the board of the Children’s Assessment Center.
“I always find time for the Center,” Bliss says with a smile. “I really believe in this work.”
— Christina Bell, Grand Valley State University
