Personal & Family Counseling Services of Tuscarawas Valley, Inc. a local human service organization, has been named by the Alliance for Children and Families to receive mentoring assistance to enhance quality-aging services. Personal & Family Counseling Services was one of 10 agencies across the United States selected though a competitive, national process to receive the grant.

The grant is part of the New Age of Aging, a five-year initiative of the Alliance for Children and Families designed to help prepare human service organizations throughout North America to best provide services for older adults as the vast baby boom generation ages. The five-year, $2.6 million project is funded by the Atlantic Philanthropies.

Personal & Family Counseling Services was selected to receive mentoring support because it is interested in aging issues and wants to enhance current aging services and gain competency in the field. PFCS has been matched with Family Service of Roanoke Valley in Virginia, which is an agency that has extensive experience in developing and providing services for Personal & Family Counseling Services’s identified areas of growth. In the coming year, the agencies will work together to establish goals and take action for expanding PFCS’s efforts in serving older adults.

“This opportunity puts Personal & Family Counseling Services in a strong position to move forward in expanding and strengthening services for older adults in Tuscarawas County,” said Marilyn L. Henry, chief executive officer of Personal & Family Counseling Services . “We are proud to have this opportunity to help meet the tremendous need of serving older adults and to partner with the Tuscarawas County Senior Center in this project.”

According to the most recent U.S. Census projections, 71.5 million Americans will reach age 65 by 2030, double the number in 2003. By 2050 that figure will grow to 86.7 million, at which point the population over age 65 will be more than 20 percent of the total. The aging boom will create a need for more human services for older adults, while the character of this generation will likely require new approaches and new paradigms for serving the aging population.

The Alliance for Children and Families, headquartered in Milwaukee, is the nation’s largest membership association of private, nonprofit human service providers. Its mission is to build the capacity of its members and to serve children, families, and communities.