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School Social Work NOW!
Supporting Innovative Practice,
Effective Leadership, and Applied Research
Vol 5, Issue 25
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Get a free poster on Student Mental Health and a Fact Sheet by clicking here.
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...Schools can and should be safe havens for students, and even more so for some students whose lives
are otherwise characterized by instability and lack of safety or security. In these cases, school personnel are uniquely well positioned to identify and report suspected abuse and connect students to services--actions that can prevent trafficking and even save lives. Everyone who is part of the school community--administrators, teachers, bus drivers, maintenance personnel, food service staff, resource officers, and other school community members--has the potential to be an advocate for child victims of human trafficking, but first, school community members must learn the indicators of the crime, its warning signs, and how to respond when a student is an apparent victim. Full report.
When confronted with the fallout of childhood trauma, why do some children adapt and overcome, while others bear lifelong scars that flatten their potential? A growing body of evidence points to one common answer: Every child who winds up doing well has had at least one stable and committed relationship with a supportive adult.
The power of that one strong adult relationship is a key ingredient in resilience - a positive, adaptive response in the face of significant adversity - according to a new report from the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, a multidisciplinary collaboration chaired by Harvard's Jack Shonkoff. Understanding the centrality of that relationship, as well as other emerging findings about the science of resilience, gives policymakers a key lever to assess whether current programs designed to help disadvantaged kids are working. Learn more.
"Dear Educator:
A child with Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD) or strongly suspected of having an Attachment Disorder is enrolled in your classroom or on your caseload. Among your multitude of duties, you are now being asked to address this child's specialized learning needs with little or no information about this disorder. Actually, this child may not be the only child in your classroom or on your caseload who has attachment difficulties. Nancy Thomas, who specializes in this disorder, reports that there are five children with attachment disruptions in the average classroom.
This child may be excessively polite or superficially charming leading you to wonder, 'This child has a behavior disorder? No way! You should meet the rest of my students!' Conversely this child may be aggressive, manipulative, or highly controlling and you may be thinking, 'What an awful child! It must be those parents!' I am ashamed to admit that those were often my thoughts until I began to understand Reactive Attachment
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Watch this TED Talks video and/or encourage your daughters--and sons--to watch it. Food for thought. Just under 15 minutes long.
...No one is a perfect leader, but most of us who are managers do think we are strong leaders anyway. Okay, so maybe you picked up some rodent-inspired views and bad leadership habits that cause your team some grief from time to time. What's the big deal?
If this is the way you operate, your bad habits may be harming your employees more than you think. A Gallup study of 7,272 U.S. adults found that that at some point during their careers, one in two had left a job just to get away from their manager.
Think for a moment how your employees respond. Does the mood change when you walk in the door? Are they receptive to you, or do they seem frustrated? These may be signs that your employees are less than enthusiastic -- and that your poor leadership may be taking its toll on team morale. More.
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A variety of universal school-based programs designed to help elementary schools foster positive student behaviors, reduce negative behaviors, and, ultimately, improve academic performance are available; however, more evidence from rigorous evaluations is needed to better understand their effects. Such information is important because the development of social competencies during middle childhood has been linked to adjustment to schooling and academic success, while the failure to develop such competencies can lead to problem behavior that interferes with success in school...This report provides the results from the evaluation of the seven SACD programs on one cohort of students as they moved from third through fifth grades starting in fall 2004 and ending in spring 2007. The evaluation examined the effects on these students of the seven programs, together and separately, after 1, 2, and 3 school years and also estimated the impact on students' growth in social and character development over the 3 years. More. |
There Are No Children Here:
The Story of Two Boys Growing Up In the Other America
By Alex Kotlowitz
There Are No Children Here...chronicles the true story of two brothers coming of age in the Henry Homer public housing project in Chicago over a two year period. Lafeyette and Pharoah Rivers, their mother and siblings struggle to survive gun battles, gang influences, overzealous police officers, and overburdened and mismanaged bureaucracies to simply survive.
Lafeyette and Pharoah Rivers are eleven and nine years old when the story begins in the summer of 1987. They live with their mother LaJoe and six siblings, through the three oldest come and go. Their father Paul is rarely around due to his drug habit. Summer is the most dangerous season as shootings are constant. The family's safe place to avoid stray bullets is in the narrow hallway of their apartment. Read more.
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A story last month in The Atlantic cited a recent American Action Forum study reporting that deporting all 11.2 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. (at least 1 million of them children) would take close to 20 years and cost the country at least $400 billion total, reducing economic growth by 5.7 percent in the process. With last summer's predictions of a 70,000 surge in undocumented children crossing the border, the figures are bound to rise, and with them, the temperature of ongoing debates.
Conversations should focus on what these kids bring to American classrooms. While they are not in school to serve someone else's needs, undocumented students often have first-hand or at least second-hand experiences with state-sanctioned persecution, civil wars, and life under leadership unaccountable to taxed constituents. These are inescapable themes in U.S. History and World Civilization classes. Consider a conversation about civil war in a social studies course in which undocumented students sit alongside middle- and high-income white kids. Read more.
New Orleans Charter Schools Unionizing
Teachers sporting "proud to be charter and union" buttons filled almost every seat in Morris Jeff Community School's library on Tuesday in anticipation of the New Orleans campus' board of directors vote to recognize their union.
The room buzzed with excitement, and the audience was rewarded with a unanimous board acknowledgement of the union, putting the five-year old charter school onto a barely blazed trail.
Like most urban districts, teachers in the New Orleans Public Schools for decades worked under union-negotiated contracts. But after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, with devastated infrastructure and too few students, the school year was effectively cancelled and the city's teachers were eventually laid off.
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ACSSW is very pleased to offer an opportunity for any school social worker to earn 1.5 FREE CEUs due to ACSSW's sponsorship of an excellent program:
Plan, Prepare, Prevent: The SOS Online
Gatekeeper Training Module
The SOS Signs of Suicide® Prevention Program is an award winning, nationally recognized program designed for middle and high school-age students. The program teaches students how to identify the symptoms of depression and suicidality in themselves or their friends, and encourages help-seeking through the use of the ACT® technique (Acknowledge, Care, Tell). This course is available free to school social workers. With sponsorship from ACSSW, all learners will receive 1.5 contact hours upon completion. Click to Learn More. Or to register call 781-239-0071 or email SOS Registration and mention that you'd like to register.
Columbia University Teachers College Press published 4 guides geared to support teachers, administrators, student personnel staff, and parents. For a limited period, and as supplies last, TCP has agreed to provide FREE copies of the guides to social workers and educators working with military kids in schools including: teachers, school administrators, PPS workers, and military parents. School social workers should be aware of this wonderful, time-limited, FREE offer from TCP. Many school social workers will benefit from these guides.
The process is simple. Each individual desiring a free book would need to click on the link, select the type of book s/he desires, and fill out name, mailing address, etc. on the Qualtrix form after selecting the book desired. The book will be mailed in a few weeks.
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School Social Work Positions
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Continued - listed by state abbreviation
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Bethel, AK
Nome, AK
Tucson, AZ
Connecticut (various)
Boise, ID pool
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Barrington, IL Summer
Chicago, IL
Tinley Park, IL soc/emot coord
DeSoto, KS
Topeka, KS
Wichita, KS
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Las Vegas, NV
Clark, NJ
Murray, UT
Spanaway, WA
Casper, WY
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Death and grief will affect the lives of almost all children at some point, often leading to struggles with academic performance, social relationships, and behavior. The death of a loved one is immensely challenging for anyone, but children and teens can find it particularly difficult. Scholastic.com, through the generosity of the New York Life Foundation, hosted a live, interactive webcast on the subject of Children and Grief. Using actual scenarios from children and parents, childhood grief expert, pediatrician, and author Dr. David Schonfeld, MD, and Chris Park, president of the New York Life Foundation, talked about misconceptions, and imparted valuable advice on how educators and all other caring adults can best support grieving children-whether it's right after the loss or years later. Download webcast.
Archived by SAMHSA & KSOC-TV
Various Archived Webinars from the Center for School Mental Health, University of Maryland
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SchoolGrants
SchoolGrants was created in 1999 as a way to share grant information with PK-12 educators. Grant writing can be intimidating to those who are new at it. SchoolGrants helps ease those fears by providing online tips to those who need them. Finding suitable grant opportunities requires a great deal of time and research - SchoolGrants reduces the effort by listing a variety of opportunities available to public and private nonprofit elementary and secondary schools and districts across the United States. Sample grants are available as well as the opportunity to sign up for a listserv and newsletter. More info.
2nd Quarter Deadline: June 30, 2015
Grants of up to $1000 are available for "innovative programs, events, or projects" from the Meemic Foundation for Michigan, Wisconsin or Illinois. Apply online using their easy application that takes less than 30 minutes to complete. These grants are open to any employee of a K-12 public or private school. Universities and colleges may also apply. Fill-in-the-blank application.
Grants are accepted year round, but the second quarter cycle ends June 30th. Grants are up to $1000. Recipients will be notified by August 15th.
The foundation says it supports "basically anything that supports teachers and enhances the student's educational experience" - from field trips to books to behavior modification programs; science, music, or art equipment to professional development.
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