TJ Michalski

TJ started his career in 1989 as a youth worker in a diagnostic facility for adolescent boys in girls at Kids Peace, formerly Whiley House, in Pennsylvania while obtaining his undergraduate degree. After graduation TJ moved back to CT and worked at Junction 1019, a co-ed group home shelter program operated by The Bridge in West Hartford. Later he went to Work at Wheeler Clinic in their Farm Hill home. He was the primary support worker for the first two foster families who lived there. The model was designed to have up to four foster youth coming out of congregate care settings and transitioning to family. After the second family moved out TJ and his ex-wife became the live in foster parents with their three children. He stayed in that role for three years.

TJ then moved to Casey Family Services as a family support specialist. He later became the Life Skills specialist creating a model life skills program copied by others. He built a youth business model to help train teens to run small business and build leadership skills. After obtaining his MSW TJ went on to become a clinical case manager at Casey where he worked for nearly 20 years until they closed the agency. 

After Casey TJ led a small non-profit youth serving agency in Hartford as their Executive Director. When he arrived he built up clinical services for youth and families and added diverse programs such as Court ordered mediation services for divorced parents and supervised visitation services. He also became a PPSP provider for the state to build on his consulting work with DCF. 

TJ came to the Village in April 2016 as a Permanency Supervisor. He filled in for a full year as the clinical manager of the FCT program. His focus at the Village is on building a culture of permanency thinking and practice to the various programs at the Village. His knowledge and skills in family work, including family finding and engagement, will be brought to bear on this new endeavor. Currently TJ is the associate vice president or permanency services and oversees the largest private foster care program in the state.