Asking for Help Is a Sign of Strength: A Public Awareness Guidebook for Crisis Nurseries and Respite Care Programs.

This public awareness package is designed to help crisis nursery and respite care programs for families with special needs children to increase the visibility of the programs' services, increase use of their services by families, enhance collaboration with other agencies, and assist with fund-raising efforts. It describes the advantages and uses of a variety of public awareness strategies, including personal and telephone contacts with key people in the community who are associated with the media or who work at organizations that may want to collaborate, radio and television coverage, newspapers, letters, brochures, posters and billboards, and slide shows and videos. A sample form for obtaining permission to take photographs or recordings of program participants is provided. Samples are also provided of a script for a telephone contact, a follow-up letter, a letter soliciting help, a press release, and scripts for public service announcements. (JDD)