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The mission of Our Place is to support teens and adults with developmental disabilities so that they can live meaningful, productive, socially connected lives in their home community.

About Us

Our Mission

The mission of Our Place is to support teens and adults with developmental disabilities so tthat hey can live meaningful, productive, socially connected lives in their home community.

Our Program

Our programs focus on developing the skills necessary for successful social interactions so that our participants can be involved in family and community activities.

In our short history, we have created a solid, unique program that meets the needs of this underserved group while improving our community.

Our Place provides:

Our after school activities allow these young people to participate in structured and casual programs with typical and developmentally disabled peers five days per week. Saturday Socials are held every week and provide our young people with an opportunity mix with typical and disabled peers and engage in conversation over dinner, socialize, dance and play games.

Program content has been enriched to give participants more opportunities to experience, model and practice social skills.

A key aspect of our program, and one that differentiates us from others, is our commitment to peer mentor involvement. We have built strong relationships with local high schools and typical peers from these schools assist in programs to provide natural peer modeling and opportunities for social engagement. Integrating typical peers into our programs effectively motivates our teens to use their developing social skills and provides support for our students as they build a network of friends in the community.

Who We Serve

We serve two primary populations. The first is adults over 22 years old who have aged out of mandated services. The second population is teens and young adults over age 16. This group can naturally transition into our full schedule of programs upon completion of their school provided services. The teens and adults we serve include, but are not limited to those with autism, Down syndrome, seizure disorder, developmental disabilities, Costello syndrome and Lowe syndrome.

We operate our programs in the center of our community at The Community Church of Wilmette, 1020 Forest Avenue, Wilmette, Illinois (Our Place is not affiliated with the church).

[Mar. 2012]