Community Partners
Find your care
Whether your child is a patient with us or has a family member in the hospital, Child Life Specialists can help.
Call to learn more about Child Life Specialists at UCLA Health.
We are proud to work with the following community partners:
- Chase Foundation
- The Peterson Family Foundation
- UCLA Athletics
- The Crayon Initiative
- The Spoonful of Music Foundation
- Musicians on Call
- Starlight Children's Foundation
- Lollipop Theater Network
- Painted Turtle
- The Big Smiles Program
- The CC Strummers
- The Spirit of Children
Helping hospitalized kids be kids
All children deserve and need the chance to be kids. Child Life Specialists help hospitalized children realize their chance to be kids by providing for their social, emotional and developmental needs, helping them cope and improving their outcomes. Through the work of the Foundation, Child Life programs have been expanded to reach more children—but there is still much work to be done. The Chase Foundation is dedicated to continuing its efforts to ensure that every child in a children’s hospital gains access to these programs. Throughout its history, the Chase Foundation has been able to provide help and hope to thousands of hospitalized children and their families.
Utilizing the power of music to address the physical, emotional, cognitive and spiritual self to improve overall health
The Peterson Family Foundation is committed to supporting organizations and programs that are passionate about both patient care and scientific advancement. In addition to supporting hospitals as they expand their music therapy programs, the Peterson Family Foundation also works with programs that focus on pediatric leukemia and diabetes.
Bruin Kids Club members receive an Official Bruin Kids Club T-shirt, an Official UCLA Lanyard and Bruin Kids Club Membership Card, Bank of the West Bear, Free admission to selected sporting events-all sports included except for men's basketball, an opportunities to participate in exclusive Bruin Kids Club promotional events, exclusive autograph sessions, and more!!!
Recycling unwanted crayons into unlimited possibilities
The Crayon Initiative organizes crayon collections that take unwanted crayons, remanufactures them, and provides them to hospitals that are caring for our kids. During a hospital stay, it’s important for children to continue normal childhood development and skills building and to keep life as close to “normal” as possible for them. Art helps hospitalized children by alleviating anxiety, providing psychological support, and offering creative outlets for self-expression. Childrens’ arts programs also enhance problem-solving and critical thinking skills, and promote creativity and imagination. Children can escape into a world of fantasy penned by their own imagination just by using crayons.
Improving the quality of life for adolescents with chronic and incurable disease.
Through the use of instructed and participatory music therapy, Spoonful of Music Foundation gives kids who are battling chronic disease a unique gift – an immersive creative experience that allows them to momentarily forget their illness while expressing themselves through music.
We deliver the healing power of music
Musicians On Call brings live and recorded music to the bedsides of patients in healthcare facilities. By delivering live, in-room performances to patients undergoing treatment or unable to leave their beds, we add a dose of joy to life in a healthcare facility. Since 1999, Musicians On Call volunteer musicians have performed for half a million patients and their families.
Bringing happiness to sick kids
Each year, more than 30 million children in the US suffer from a chronic, critical or terminal illness. Many of these kids experience long hospital stays, painful medical treatments and sometimes a scary and uncertain future. Starlight brings joy to sick kids through entertainment, education and technology – because a sick kid is still a kid at heart.
Bringing movie magic to hospitalized children
Lollipop Theater Network is dedicated to bringing the magic of movies currently showing in theaters to children confined to hospitals nationwide due to chronic or life-threatening illnesses. Their goal is to create a fun escape from the daily reality of the illnesses these children face and to offer them and their families a moment of normalcy in an otherwise stressful environment.
Innovative camp programs for children and families
Welcome to The Painted Turtle where children with serious medical conditions celebrate just being kids! Through innovative, camp-based programs that offer a great big dose of fun and support, children with more than 70 medical conditions visit The Painted Turtle each year, reclaiming the joys of childhood. Without The Painted Turtle, many of these children would never know the simple yet profound experience of camp, an experience that often has a life-long impact. A member of Paul Newman’s renowned SeriousFun Camps (formerly the Association of Hole in the Wall Camps), The Painted Turtle has offered thousands of children and their families hope and encouragement through its Summer and Family Weekend camps since it opened its gates in 2004.
Where smiles bring the colors of love onto the canvas of life
The Big Smiles Program operates in support of the Chase Foundation, whose primary purpose is to provide the financial support to keep Child Life Programs funded. We provide consistent paint sessions in conjunction with the Chase Child Life Program. Once a month, the Big Smiles Team wheels canvases, paints, brushes, squeegees, stamps, stickers and much more into UCLAMattel Children’s Hospital. We give the children complete control of their painting experience and guide them (when prompted) in their self-expression. Paint flies, big smiles are exchanged, and happiness is shared.
Providing recreational music performances to patients
The music volunteers from The CC Strummers have been visiting patients at UCLA Mattel Children's Hospital every month since 2016, donating ukulele, hosting performances and sharing great resources with patients and families.
Founded in 2006, Spirit of Children helps make hospitals less scary for kids and their families by providing fun during Halloween and funding all year long to Child Life Departments within children's hospitals. Each year with the help of our vendor partners, Spirit sponsors and hosts Halloween celebrations in children's hospitals throughout the country. Members of the Spirit field team bring everything that's needed in order to have the best party possible from costumes to goody bags. Everything brought to the hospitals is donated by Spirit and our vendor partners. It's a remarkable event that touches thousands of pediatric patients and brings countless smiles and laughter to children who might otherwise miss out on the joy of Halloween.
This donation was made possible by . For several years, support from Spirit Halloween has enabled the Chase Child Life Program to fund a Child Life specialist in the ER
Spirit Halloween Coupon
Save 10% off your entire order, Spirit Halloween gives 10% TO UCLA Mattel Children's Hospital. Present coupon in any Spirit Halloween or enter promo code CARING18 at checkout when shopping at SpiritHalloween.com