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School Social Work Now!
Supporting Innovative Practice,
Effective Leadership & Applied Research
March 2013 - Vol 3, Issue 23 |
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Greetings! | |
This comes with hopes that you are experiencing a fantastic National School Social Work Week! Although it's drawing to a close, be sure to spread the word. ACSSW has put together a number of ideas regarding ways to celebrate and share the importance and joy of school social work. The ACSSW 2013 School Social Work Week Poster is now available for you to download. School Social Work Week Celebration Ideas are also ready. Celebrate and highlight the profession!
A colleague requests your help! Steve Whitmore, webmaster of the Michigan Association of School Social Workers (MASSW), is conducting a survey regarding the use of I-pads in School Social Work Practice. To complete the survey of application and/or website use on I-pads, smartphones, Kindles, and other devices, please go to: Tablet & Smartphone App Survey. It will take only a few minutes. Please feel free to pass this survey along to other school social workers. Deadline is March 31, 2013. Questions should be directed to: Steve Whitmore.
ACSSW continues to promote our National School Mental Health campaign:
Wear the Green
We are encouraging school social workers to wear a green ribbon to promote Mental Health Services in Schools provided by school social workers and other mental health providers. Every student deserves access to supportive mental health services! If you are interested in more information or green ribbon pins, please contact us. You may also view a picture and/or download the order form now. Each pin comes with two pages of Mental Health Tips andTalking Points that can be discussed or shared with administrators, staff, parents, and so on. Start a campaign in your school and Wear the Green! Good mental health is so essential to positive school and life outcomes. Please show your support today.
Judith Kullas Shine
President |
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Recommended Read for March | |
Learning from Behavior: How to Understand and Help Challenging Children in School
by James E. Levine
Forward by Sophie Freud
Understanding children's problem behaviors in school-seeing beyond the surface actions to reveal and name the root needs fueling those actions-is vital to helping the child. Yet, whether teachers in schools or parents at home, adults often make quick, cursory assessments, then an intervention is sprung. Explanations might be sought from the child, who often resists and becomes more distant. Punishment can occur and things are "taken away," but the behavior worsens. These scenarios and similar occurrences frustrate parents, teachers, and other school professionals alike. In Learning from Behavior, Levine shows us how to observe, question, and think about problem behaviors in such a way that we can understand what is motivating the children to act as they do. Behavior, after all, often represents what the child cannot communicate, due to language limitations, level of psychological development, or traumatic experience. Children think differently; they are not small adults. We need to understand the behavior from the child's perspective before we can intervene to change the behavior. Author Levine shows us, incorporating illustrative vignettes, how to do that. Read more.
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Come on . . . Follow Us!! | |
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Practice Points | |
Responding to Childhood Trauma: The Promise and Practice of Trauma Informed Care
From the level of the individual child and family to specific child-serving programs to the broader arena of policy, the recognition of the pervasiveness of trauma and the consequent provision of what is known as "trauma informed care" will need to significantly influence our work in mental health and related fields in the future (Harris and Fallot, 2001, and National Executive Training Institute [NETI], 2003). Trauma is not a new concept. However, until recently, it has largely been viewed to be applicable to only a select group of individuals, under extraordinary circumstances - for example, survivors of catastrophic events such as war, earthquakes, and abduction. With notable exceptions, trauma has not been recognized as a part of the daily, regular, experience of many individuals, including children and adolescents. Nor has the profound linkage between trauma and child development and the disruption of physical and emotional health been fully recognized.
The goal of this paper is to build on comprehensive efforts by the National Technical Assistance Center for Mental Health Planning (NTAC), the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors (NASMHPD) and others, to increase appreciation of the relevance of trauma in understanding children and in planning to meet their needs. Click here and scroll down to access the title and full paper.
Immigrant Family Engagement
This Policy Update examines some of the challenges that schools face in educating immigrant children and focuses on one important strategy for improving their educational prospects: engaging the parents of immigrant students.
Educators have long been concerned about overall achievement gaps and dropout rates for immigrant students, but it is important to remember that these students also do worse on non-academic measures of well-being. They often live in low-income neighborhoods and attend struggling schools, conditions that counteract the impact of protective factors, such as a higher likelihood of living in a two-parent family. Read full report.
12 Things High School Students with ADHD Want Teachers to Know
This list has been compiled by teens with ADHD. They have kindly shared what is important to them and what they find most frustrating in working with teachers and parents.View slides.
PBIS and the Responsive Classroom Approach
PBIS identifies several features that are key to success in schoolwide efforts to support children's positive behavior. The Responsive Classroom approach offers a rich array of practices that match these features. Using the Responsive Classroom approach can therefore help your school implement PBIS successfully. . . PBIS and the Responsive Classroom approach share many more commonalities than dissimilarities. There are, however, some differences between the two. One difference is that the Responsive Classroom approach does not offer tertiary prevention strategies, the individualized interventions for students at high risk, although it provides foundational supports for those students. Learn more about similarities and differences between these two efforts.
7 Mistakes Therapists Make
Every week I talk with aspiring private practitioners (psychology graduate students) who want to know how to have long, productive careers so they can pay back their student loans. Recently I was asked the opposite question - what's the recipe for misery and futility as a therapist? I was intrigued. It's not the best approach to always focus on the negative, but sometimes it helps us to better define the positive.
So here we go. Want a brief, disappointing career as a psychotherapist? No problem. Follow these seven simple rules. Learn the 7 mistakes. |
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Leadership News | |
Holding the Helm: Exploring the Influence of Transformational Leadership on Group Creativity and the Moderating Role of Organizational Learning Culture
Since its debut, transformational leadership has received a great deal of attention. TFL was pioneered by Burns (1978), who defined it as a reinforcing process between the leader and the follower, elevating them to higher planes of motivation and morality. TFL was developed further by Bass (1985) and Bass and Avolio (1995). It is a concept that embraces mutual engagement while attempting to achieve a common goal. It transforms followers and organizations through the promotion of selfless ideals that encourage performance beyond expectations. TFL includes four components. . .
In the psychological literature, the concept of creativity usually refers to the production, by individuals or groups, of ideas and solutions considered not only original and innovative but also useful and appropriate (Amabile, 1996; Sternberg & Lupart, 1999). The potential of groups to engage in rich exploration, discovery, and innovation in various fields has motivated many researchers, leaders, and field practitioners to promote and study group creativity (e.g., Shneiderman et al., 2006). An overwhelming amount of the literature argues that groups are bad for creativity (Paulus, Nakui, & Putman, 2006) in that they appear to reduce motivation to share divergent ideas out of concern for peer evaluation of member's ideas. . .
There are seven dimensions of a learning organization: continuous learning, inquiry and dialogue, team learning, empowerment, supportive or strategic leadership, embedded system, and system connection (Yang, Watkins, & Marsick, 2004; Song, 2008) Most of these are pertinent to TFL and/or GC. Read full article. |
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Research Highlights |  Psychological distress (symptoms of anger, anxiety and depression) is surprisingly common among adolescents. For example, approximately one-quarter of adolescents experience a major depressive disorder (Lewinsohn, Rohde, & Seeley, 1998) and approximately one-half of older adolescents report moderate or high levels of depressive symptoms (Rosenthal & Schreiner, 2000). Depression and anxiety are highly co-morbid and may represent a single dysfunctional psychological state (Cf., Briere 1995; Olino et al., 2008), which is often described as "psychological distress." Many studies have attempted to identify the causes of psychological distress, and several types of traumatic events have been found to be correlated with it. Unfortunately, the correlations between various specific types of traumatic experiences and psychological distress are rather small. More.
Effective Treatment for High Functioning Autism
The Institute for Autism Research at Canisius College recently conducted a randomized clinical trial on the efficacy of a comprehensive 5-week summer treatment for children with high-functioning autism spectrum disorders. The researchers found that participation in the program resulted in improved social performance and clinical symptoms, including non-literal language skills, knowledge of appropriate social behaviors, and overall ratings of autism symptoms by parents and camp staff.Full article. |
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In the News | |
Kazarian: Schools Need More Social Workers
Schools need more social workers and funding for mental health intervention, according to East Providence Rep. Katherine Kazarian.
Kazarian has introduced package of bills she hopes will begin to address one of the principal areas of concern discussed nationally in the effort to prevent future tragedies like the one in Newtown, CT.
"Our schools need the resources to more effectively assist students and families with a range of mental health and behavioral issues for their good and the good of our communities," Kazarian said. . . Kazarian's first bill, (2013-H 5320), would require all public schools in grades kindergarten through grade 12 to have at least one full-time certified school social worker for every 400 students. More.
US Rep from Wisconsin, Gwen Moore, Introduces School Social Work Week Resolution
Congresswoman Gwen Moore (WI-4) introduced a resolution that would designate March 3 - 9 as "School Social Work Week." She released the following statement:
"This week, I am so proud to introduce this resolution to recognize the many contributions of school social workers. While I recognize the incredibly important role teachers play in a student's success, school social workers are especially equipped to mentor students dealing with poverty, disability, discrimination or other issues in their personal lives. Often these issues can become a barrier to learning unless handled properly. By working to strengthen positive social and emotional development in our children, school social workers improve the success rate of children coming from a disadvantaged background, lending a much-needed hand in our efforts to create a more equal society. Continue.
Budget Cuts to Hit Military School Districts First
School districts with military ties from coast-to-coast are bracing for increased class sizes and delayed building repairs. Others already have axed sports teams and even eliminated teaching positions, but still may have to tap savings just to make it through year's end. But there's little hope for softening any future financial blows. . .
The schools' losses will come from cuts to a federal program known as "Impact Aid" that supplements local property tax losses for districts that cover federal land, including military posts and Indian tribal areas. About 1,400 school districts serving roughly 11 million children nationwide - including nearly 376,500 students from military families - benefit from the aid, said Jocelyn Bissonnette, director of government affairs for the Washington-based National Association of Federally Impacted Schools. Read more.
The Importance of Early Treatment
The U.S. Senate recently held a hearing in response to the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary focused on the issue of mental health. The meeting emphasized that although three-quarters of mental illnesses emerge during childhood, adolescence, or young adulthood, fewer than 20% of youth with mental health diagnoses are receiving treatment. It was suggested that receiving early treatment could be critical to preventing more extreme difficulties later in life, including suicide and violence. More.
Connecticut School Shooting National Position Statement
Nine school violence prevention researchers and practitioners nationwide have developed a position statement in response to the tragic acts of violence at Sandy Hook Elementary School. This position statement has been endorsed by more than 200 professional organizations, including ACSSW, and nationally recognized researchers and practitioners, including the Center for School Mental Health. The driving force behind the statement is to communicate scientifically informed principles and recommendations for practitioners, policymakers and the public at large. The co-authors' goal is to help build consensus on a course of meaningful action. Read statement. |
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Survey Completion Request |
You are invited to participate in a brief 20 minute anonymous survey. The Center for School Mental Health at the University of Maryland School of Medicine is conducting this survey (a) to understand the barriers to engaging caregivers in school-based mental health treatment, and (b) to develop best practices for engaging caregivers in school-based mental health treatment. Mental health professionals who provide school-based mental health services are invited to complete this survey. Participation involves completing a 20 minute online survey of mental health professionals' experiences with engaging caregivers in school-based mental health treatment. Your participation in this survey is completely voluntary. In addition, your responses are completely anonymous and confidential. If you decide to participate, you may discontinue participation at any time, or if you feel uncomfortable answering any questions, you may choose "skip" as the answer or you may leave the text box blank. By completing the survey, you are providing consent to participate in this evaluation. Please contact Dr. Nicole Evangelista Brandt or 410-706-0980 with questions. Thank you in advance! Go to School-Based Mental Health Survey. |
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Webinars | |
The Heart of Learning and Teaching: Compassion, Resilience and Academic Success
Wednesday, March 20 from 1:00-2:30 EST
Every day in schools across the nation, students arrive in classrooms feeling hungry, tired, frustrated, and alone. They are often impacted by alcohol and other drugs, physical or mental health-related issues, homelessness, abuse, domestic violence, or are struggling with a learning disability and are at risk of dropping out of school. These students frequently lack vital connections to their family, their school, and their community.
In response to these critical student needs, this webinar will review The Heart of Learning and Teaching: Compassion, Resiliency and Academic Success which describes some of the collective efforts necessary to help students overcome trauma, demonstrate resilience, and success physically, emotionally, socially, and academically in the school setting. This publication is available online free of charge to all interested at Heart of Learning Handbook.
The webinar will be presented by two of the publication's authors: Mona M. Johnson, MA, CPP, CDP (Chief School Behavioral Health, US Army Medical Command, Child, Adolescent, and Family Behavioral Health) and Ron Hertel, BA (Readiness to Learn, Compassionate Schools, Mental Health Learning and Teaching Support, Washington State Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction).
The webinar is free but requires advance registration because the online meeting capacity is limited to the first 300 individuals. If you have questions please email Dr. Nicole Evangelista Brandt. To register please complete the online survey.
ARCHIVED & AVAILABLE
Keeping Common School Areas Safe presented 3/20/2012 and
Teasing, Taunting, Bullying, Harassment, Hazing, and Physical Aggression: Prevention, Strategic Intervention, and Crisis Management presented 5/11/2012
Teasing, taunting, bullying, harassment, hazing, and physical aggression are persistent problems with children and adolescents in schools across the country. These events typically occur in common areas of the school (i.e. hallways, bathrooms, buses, cafeteria). To help address these problems and provide schools with comprehensive, evidence-based approaches to school-wide discipline, behavior management and student self-management, Project Achieve is providing two online presentations at no cost to view at your own convenience. Each presentation, about 60 minutes long, discusses ways to implement social skills training, peer mediated approaches, a school wide accountability system, school and common school area safety system, and home-school collaboration approaches. Click the links above to access.
Understanding the Developmental Needs of Young Families Experiencing Homelessness
Young families who are homeless often have unique needs based on both the challenges of trauma and homelessness and their developmental stage. A developmental perspective is essential to tailoring services to meet the needs of this population. During the first session of this course, we will provide an overview of development from birth through young adulthood; child and adult brain development; expected behaviors and responses at each stage; and the impact of trauma on development. Register to access.
Understanding the Impact of Trauma in the Lives of Displaced Children and Families
The prevalence of traumatic stress in the lives of displaced children and families is extraordinarily high. Experiences of trauma can have a significant impact on how families interact with each other and with service providers. In this webinar, participants will learn about the connection between traumatic stress, displacement, and homelessness; the mind-body response to stress and trauma; factors that influence our responses to trauma, particularly cultural factors; and the impact of chronic trauma on all areas of functioning. Register here to access. |
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Grants & Funding | |
Champion Creatively Alive Children
Crayola Creative Leadership Grants 2013
Crayola, in collaboration with the National Association of Elementary School Principals, is accepting applications for the 2013 Creative Leadership Grant program. The program will award up to twenty grants of $2,500 to elementary schools working to develop a team of leaders who can help increase arts-infused education within school and beyond. In addition, each program will receive an in-kind grant of Crayola products valued at $1,000.
Applications will only be accepted from principals who are members of NAESP. Every school that submits an application by June 10 will receive a Crayola product Classpack. Click to access application. Deadline: June 21, 2013.
American Psychiatric Foundation: Typical or Troubled?™ Grant
Typical or Troubled? ™ is a school community program designed to educate teachers and other school staff, and parents on the warning signs of emotional and behavioral health issues; how to talk to students who may be experiencing problems and engage family members: and help connect students to appropriate resources within the school or community. To date, the program has been implemented in 35 states, over 500 schools and districts, and connected with over 510,000 students. Importantly, the program has resulted in critical interventions with student in need, ignited positive dialogue and collaboration among the school community, and resulted in establishing or improving referral systems and connections to services within the schools.
For those who work in or with two or more middle or high schools, you are eligible to apply for a grant sponsored by the American Psychiatric Foundation to implement the Typical or Troubled? ™ School Mental Health Education program. Grant awards depend on innovative educational materials, brochures, evaluation tools, technical assistance, and connections with many of your colleagues across the nation. In addition, grant awards depend on the number of schools. For implementation in two to four high schools grant awards in the amount of $1,000 and for implementation in five or more high schools grant awards in the amount of $2,000. The application deadline is March 30, 2013. For more information click here. If you have additional questions email: APF.
Ezra Jack Keats Foundation Accepting Minigrant Applications
Established by children's book author and illustrator Ezra Jack Keats, the Ezra Jack Keats Foundation is accepting applications from public schools and public libraries anywhere in the United States and its territories for program or event mini-grants of up to $500. The mini-grants program is intended to support projects that foster creative expression, collaboration, and interaction with a diverse community. The funding program provides an opportunity for educators, whose efforts are often inadequately funded or recognized, to create special activities outside the standard curriculum and make time to encourage their students. For more information and application, click here. Deadline: March 15, 2013
NEA Foundation-Nickelodean Big Help Grant
Sponsored by Nickelodeon and the NEA Foundation, NEA Foundation-Nickelodeon Big Help Grants provide up to $5,000 to K-8 public school educators in the United States. The Big Help Grants program is dedicated to the development and implementation of ideas, techniques, and approaches to addressing four key concerns - environmental awareness, health and wellness, students' right to a quality public education, and active community involvement. The grants target these four concerns as areas of great promise in helping students in the twenty-first century develop a global awareness that encourages and enables them to make a difference in their world. Applicants must be practicing U.S public school teachers or public school education support professional. The application process is the same as for the NEA Foundation's Student Achievement grants. Applicants should specify that their request is for the Big Help Grants program in their application. Application deadline is June 1, 2013. Link to RFP. |
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ACSSW Activities | |
ACSSW's present activities include:
- increasing research projects and their application within the school environment;
- developing a national school social work role framework paper;
- establishing a National Center for School Social Work Practice, Leadership and Research, a long-term goal,
- presenting the 4th National School Social Work Research Summit. Watch for details to come.
If you have interest in participating in any of these activities, contact Judie Shine. ACSSW strives to be inclusive and transparent in all of its activities and welcomes, whether lengthy or short, the participation of its members. |
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