ABOUT THE MORRIS CENTER
A non-profit 501(c)(3) public benefit corporation, THE MORRIS CENTER
was founded in 1991 (as the Adult Survivors of Incest Foundation) to provide individual and group sliding scale psychotherapy and low-cost educational and self-help programs for adult survivors of sexual abuse. In November 1993 the name of the organization was changed to The Norma J. Morris Center for healing from child abuse. This changed reflected the fact that its programs had expanded to serve survivors of physical and emotional, as well as sexual, abuse, and to honor the organization's co-founder and principal benefactor, Norma Morris.

In 1994, perceiving an increased need for cost-effective, easily replicable programs, THE MORRIS CENTER shifted its primary focus to our ASCA support program and discontinued its psychotherapy program. ASCA began to take shape in January, 1993, when George J. Bilotta, Ph.D., THE MORRIS CENTER's Executive Director, asked J. Patrick Gannon, Ph.D., to develop his ideas for a "second generation" self-help group for adult survivors of child abuse. This edition of the Survivor to Thriver manual is an updated and expanded edition of Dr. Gannon's book: Soul Survivors: A New Beginning for Adults Abused as Children along with additional material from our unpublished manual The ASCA Workbook.

In February, 1993, the ASCA Leadership Council, composed of volunteers interested in developing the new program, started to create the Stage One meeting format, program guidelines and Co-Secretary responsibilities. The first ASCA meeting was held in May 1993, in San Francisco. ASCA has continued to evolve and has become a powerful and effective support program for adult survivors of child abuse.

In September 1999, THE MORRIS CENTER began to promote the ASCA program nationally through the World Wide Web. It is our desire and hope that through this efficient and cost effective avenue, ASCA will become available to survivors of child abuse throughout the country.

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Survivor to Thriver, Page 5
© 2007 THE MORRIS CENTER, Revised 11/06