Georgia Psychological Services is a privately-held corporation founded in Augusta in 2000. GPS was formed to provide contracted mental health services in the public sector. GPS now provides services under five contracts with various governmental bodies.  Our primary contracts are for the provision of substance abuse treatment and mental health and developmental disabilities supplemental case management to TANF recipients in the East Central Georgia area.

Nationwide, the TANF welfare reform efforts have been successful, but there exists a large population of TANF recipients who have not been able to enter the workplace because of barriers related to untreated mental health and substance abuse problems.  This population has been notoriously difficult to reach and reluctant to utilize traditional mental health services. GPS operates under a corporate philosophy of providing quality services through innovative and non-traditional service delivery systems.  Our philosophy was developed in an effort to address the multiple barriers to treatment in the populations we serve.

Our TANF substance abuse treatment program, New Choices, was designed to replace a program in a traditional mental health center which was not successful in attracting and maintaining consumer participation. The New Choices program, like all GPS services, is integrated into the community rather than in a dedicated treatment facility.  New Choices is housed in an inner city church that is convenient to pubic transportation, has an attached day-care center, and has a ministry targeted specifically for our consumers.  Although programming is supervised by a clinical psychologist and another mental health professional, it is staffed primarily by paraprofessionals with varied training and life experiences in recovery, DFCS case management, and education. Treatment is based on the GPS model of training in psychological skills to increase consumers’ overall level of functioning. The result has been a tremendously successful program with this difficult population.

The GPS MH/DD Supplemental Case Management program was designed to address the needs of consumers by providing individual and group services in local communities and by assisting consumers to take advantage of existing opportunities and resources. Case management is flexible and individually planned.  We have provided such services as referral for more intense services, job coaching, assisting in the SSI application process, literacy training, and tutoring to obtain drivers’ licenses. This program also includes group educational sessions emphasizing psychological and life skills.

GPS has recently added billable services which include New Opportunities, a psychosocial rehabilitation day treatment program. New Opportunities is also based on our psychological skills model, but is focused on developing skills necessary for consumers to begin work or training programs.  This program is also located in an inner city church with a specialized ministry focusing on our consumers.

Our newest billable service, Foster Care Transition, is designed to ease the transition for children placed in foster homes and to assist the foster parents in dealing with victims of trauma.  The aim of the program is to stabilize placements and to reduce the need for children to be moved once they are placed.  Our FCT teams are on call twenty-four hours a day to deal with emergencies.  All services are provided to the children and foster parents in their homes, schools, or local Department of Family and Children Services offices.

We at GPS are dedicated to providing the highest quality mental health and related services through innovative service delivery systems.  We feel that our strengths include our ability to plan services directly related to the needs of the target populations without being bound by traditional patterns of service provision, traditional professional boundaries, or unnecessary administrative interference.  We have pioneered true community treatment, decentralized services, and paperless records in our service area. Our goals for the future include continued creativity in developing service delivery models and a redoubling of efforts to ensure quality in all of our services.