ALS-Focused Grateful Featured at Heartland Film Festival

Experienced in education and business development strategies, Indiana entrepreneur Thomas Stoughton works with a diversity of consulting clients. Community focused, Thomas Stoughton was among those who helped launch the Heartland Film Festival, which has been running annually in Indianapolis for nearly three decades.

One unique short featured at the Heartland Film Festival in October 2018 was Grateful, which had its debut at the Indy Shorts International Film Festival. Also earning Best Documentary Film at the Circle City Festival and being shown internationally, Grateful focuses on one woman’s experience of living with ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease.

The film’s producer, Amy Pauszek, worked with a friend who is living with the progressive neurodegenerative disease on the documentary, which lent it a particularly heartfelt quality. As Ms. Pauszek describes it, people who view Grateful tend to laugh and cry while finding a source of inspiration. To date, this is the seventh film the producer has filmed in Indiana, with all having aimed at making a difference in people’s lives.

Progress House Aims to Reduce Jail Recidivism with Support Services

A distinguished education, management, and technology consultant, Thomas Stoughton is the former president of the Indiana-based firm Business Consulting Incorporated. In addition to a long career advising business and municipal leaders, Thomas Stoughton has dedicated resources to support the addiction-recovery program at Progress House in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Since 2017, Progress House has been an approved provider of Recovery Works.
The program aims to make mental-health treatment and addiction-recovery services available to people uncovered by insurance who otherwise may end up behind bars. It also enhances community-supervision initiatives to reduce the chances of reincarceration for those recovering from an addiction.

According to statistics, many Americans are part of the criminal justice system because they lack healthcare coverage and adequate resources to seek treatment. For instance, approximately 16 percent of currently-incarcerated individuals have a diagnosed mental illness and 53 percent of the State Prison population have a substance-abuse disorder. Additionally, 75 percent of people who return to prison also have a substance-abuse disorder. Progress House and Recovery Works administrators believe that increased mental-health and addiction-service support will help people break destructive cycles and stay out of prison.

Heartland Film Festival Featured Women Directors, Unreleased Film

The president of the Indiana-based firm Business Consulting Incorporated for 10 years, Thomas Stoughton built a reputation as a distinguished public policy and educational technology consultant. Aside from his successful consulting business, Thomas Stoughton founded the Heartland Film Festival, held each year in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Held in October 2018, the 27th annual Heartland Film Festival screened more than 100 feature-length films on a wide variety of subjects. One of those screenings was of the motion picture What They Had before it was released nationwide. Featuring two-time Academy Award winner Hilary Swank, What They Had tells the story of a family that struggles when confronting the matriarch’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis. Released everywhere on October 19, 2018, the film also stars Blythe Danner, Michael Shannon, and Robert Forster.

Aside from the buzz about the unreleased film, this year’s Heartland festival was marked by progress toward the goal of promoting gender equity. In 2018, the directors of half of the finalist films in the narrative and documentary categories were women. The festival also included a documentary about gender equity called Seeing is Believing: Women Direct. For information on the 2019 Heartland Film Festival, visit HeartlandFilm.org.

Halfway Houses Help to Improve Lives

Accomplished business consultant Thomas Stoughton supports technology, civic, education, and business development initiatives that benefit his native Indiana. Thomas Stoughton of Indiana is particularly committed to supporting halfway houses and other addiction recovery efforts.

Also known as sober living homes, halfway houses are drug-free environments designed for individuals who struggle with addiction, mental health, or any other issue that makes living on their own difficult. By staying at such a house, residents can develop the self-confidence and skills they need to re-enter society after an inpatient or outpatient recovery program, homelessness, or prison without subjecting themselves to the triggering environment that likely led to their addiction in the first place.

Not every halfway house operates in the same way. For instance, some may require that residents pass a breathalyzer test or drug screening before being welcomed into the home. However, halfway houses share some general similarities. The individuals living at the home must commit to a sober lifestyle and contribute to the house by completing regular chores. Unlike inpatient programs, residents of halfway houses are allowed to come and go as they please in accordance with the house’s rules.

Several studies have demonstrated the efficacy of halfway houses over the years. According to these, one of the biggest obstacles people face to staying sober is not having a stable, sober environment. Halfway houses fill this void and allow people to live without as many temptations to go back to drugs or alcohol. Further, the 12-step group affiliation at many halfway houses leads to higher abstinence from addiction.