Tagged With "social worker"
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A Community Approach to Trauma Sensitivity / Making a Difference Conference in MA in November
The 6th Annual Making a Difference Conference for SESPs, Foster/Adoptive and Kinship Caregivers and their Professional Partners will be held in Marlborough, MA on November 14, 2017. The theme is A Community Approach to Trauma Sensitivity. There will be at least two talks will be about ACEs! Speakers/Topics: Keynote: Managing the Hearts and Souls of Many, Dana Royster-Buefort, M.Ed., C.A.G.S. Workshops Tackling ACEs by Building Resilient Communities , Renee D Boynton-Jarrett, MD, ScD . Note:...
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A Week in the Life of a School Social Worker [psychotherapynetworker.org]
Public School 48, where I’m on staff as a social worker, sits on a block between a juvenile detention center and a strip club. The school serves around 900 mostly Hispanic and African American children in prekindergarten through fifth grade, with a large percentage of those kids living in shelter apartments. Of course, PS 48 has an educational mission, not a clinical one, but I’m part of a service staff that includes speech, occupational, and physical therapists. I’ve been a school social...
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ACEs & African Americans Community on ACEs Connection
ACEs Connection envisions a resilient world where ALL people thrive. We are an anti-racist organization committed to the pursuit of social justice. In our work to promote resilience and prevent and mitigate ACEs, we intentionally embrace and uplift people who have historically not had a seat at the table. ACEs Connection celebrates the voices and tells the stories of people who have been barred from decision-making and who have shouldered the burden of systemic and economic oppression as the...
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Addressing childhood trauma in Laconia schools [laconiadailysun.com]
Over the last few years, the Laconia School District has been actively working to understand what childhood trauma is, how it impacts our students, and what we, as an educational institution can do to mitigate the effects of this. We have also learned about secondary, or vicarious, trauma. This type of trauma is experienced by our staff as a result of supporting our students who are living with ongoing and pervasive trauma. Our teachers and support staff are serving in pseudo social worker...
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An Epic Battle for Public Education: A Front Line View
As one single example of one key complexity (there are many others), children in our Public School classrooms have massive rates of trauma, described by a U.S. Department of Justice report as an “epidemic” and by past Surgeon Generals as “national crisis.”
The Center for Disease Control(CDC) says it is critical to understan
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An Evidence-Based Indictment of Inaction
If schools are to be guided by data, the data says more than 2 of 3 children experience at least one ACE: children of all incomes, all colors, all social levels, all educational levels. It is all of us. Is your school trauma-informed?
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An Evidence-Based Indictment of Inaction
If schools are to be guided by data, the data says that 2 of 3 children experience at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE): children of all incomes, all colors, all social levels, all educational levels. It is all of us. Is your school trauma-informed?
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An imperative for those in "towers" to connect with the realities of trauma in schools
Boosting SEL in K-12's "Ivory Towers" Educational Leadership October 2018 | Volume 76 | Number 2 The Promise of Social-Emotional Learning Those of us in administration must lift our "social awareness" by getting closer to schools and the people inside them. The superintendent's leadership team for the district where I was working had just finished its Monday morning meeting. One member of that team stopped as he passed by my cubicle to view the large poster I'd recently hung up. It displayed...
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Peek Inside a Classroom: Jasmine
© Elliot Gilfix/Flickr . What happened to Jasmine? . Photo © Jinx!/Flickr When you look inside a...
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Peek Inside a Classroom: Jose
Photo credit Max Klingensmith at flickr . Jose was one of the calmest, quietest, most peaceful boys in the classroom. The kind of boy everybody loves. ...
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PHILADELPHIA CITY COUNCIL, EDUCATION COMMITEE: STANDARDIZED TESTING HEARING: TESTIMONY NOTES
"We won’t have a successful education paradigm, or even accurately interpret academic success, while ignoring trauma’s overwhelming presence." ...
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ConVal High School's Story: Becoming Trauma-Informed for Substance Abuse Prevention
As a student assistance counselor, I regularly receive flashy emails from various organizations promoting materials for drug-free schools. Secretly I roll my eyes and strike the trash icon. “Drug free schools - ha, right?!” It may sound cynical or jaded that I don’t believe in drug-free high schools. It’s not that. The truth is I don’t believe a drug-free high school exists. This isn’t from a lack of effort or concern. As a product of the “Just Say No” era, schools have worked for decades to...
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Danny goes to school
Danny goes to school. The story of one child, hoping to be safe. http://lucidwitness.com/2014/0...anny-goes-to-school/
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Defending Childhood
Common Sense Millions of injured children whose pleas are not being heard are waiting at the intersection of the “Defending Childhood” Report from the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Congress’s rewrite...
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Destigmatizing mental health starts in schools (districtadministration.com)
After the city of Fishers, an Indianapolis suburb of about 90,000, had 13 suicides in 2016, city officials launched a campaign to destigmatize mental health issues - including in the school system. District Mental Health Coordinator Brooke Lawson and Assistant Superintendent of Staff and Student Services Michael Beresford discuss the challenges of addressing mental health issues, and how a student-launched club is helping to remove the stigma attached to mental illness. Tell us about Stigma...
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District finds that creating more trauma-informed schools requires a change of culture [thenotebook.org]
“The world of thinking about trauma, the importance of school climate and social-emotional learning is 20, 30, 40 years behind the world of instruction." Joanna Schwartz, a 2nd-grade teacher at Eliza B. Kirkbride Elementary School, was about to take a scheduled break and desperately needed a place to have peace and quiet. But the only place she could find was a broom closet. A few years earlier, in another school, Schwartz said teachers were baffled by a 3rd grader who continually fell...
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Do Children have a Right to be Safe ?
A comparison survey of government and departmental(legal vs. healthcare, vs. education) treatment of child safety given prevalence of childhood trauma. http://lucidwitness.com/2014/0...-right-to-be-safe-2/
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Do you know a ‘Danny’ or an ‘Ashley’, struggling socially, emotionally, or academically?
PSAs designed to help grow awareness of the impacts of developmental or 'childhood' trauma. All the narratives are about real kids (with pseudonyms) who are trauma-impacted. These are not "combined" or imaginary narratives, nor caricatures.
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Education Transformations - Providing Soc/Emot Training to Schools & More
Education Transformations is a company that works with districts, schools, teachers, and other organizations to improve Social/Emotional Intelligence (EQ), and what we call Relational Competency. We are San Diego, CA based, but can travel.
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Extending Mental Health Help to Vulnerable Kids (health.usnews.com)
Open-ended discussions with children and teens can uncover traumatic causes of behavioral and emotional problems. "It's not necessarily asking, 'Would you like access to mental health services?'" explains La Toya Mobley, a pediatric clinical social worker at the Harriet Lane Clinic. Rather, it's posing questions like, "What is your experience at home?" to get at the heart of the matter. "Trauma and ADHD mirror each other," Mobley says. "So we're asking more questions about trauma, especially...
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Failing Schools or Failing Paradigm ?
Yes, money matters in Education. Money is absolutely necessary, but money is Not sufficient. A key variable has been missing from the discussions about a new Education Paradigm: Childhood Trauma. Childhood trauma is broad in scope...
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Free Resource: A Children's Book to Help Understand Social Distancing
Here's a link to the book I wrote to help kids understand social distancing and express their own emotions. This is really important or things stay bottled up inside. It is now in video version; podcast and ebook are coming. Feel free to forward to others -- kids of all ages across the nation and the globe.Reprint the link. Do an article on it. Share with friends. Circulate it. Tweet it. Free resource. Bottom line: make it viral. The cover is attached!!! I hope it helps. Navigating emotions...
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From Trauma Informed To Trauma Transformed: Achieving Post-Traumatic GROWTH for the Youths In Our Most Disenfranchised Public Schools and Communities
Roberto Rivera was a troubled, addicted youth engaged in criminal behavior who discovered his path to transformation in the pit of his traumatic pain. He harnessed the fire of early childhood trauma to change himself from being a problem to being a solution, not just in his own life, but also in the lives of many, many other under-privileged and under-performing young people. The name of his solution is Fulfill The Dream (FTD). FTD is a unique, hip-hop(e) based, Social Emotional Learning...
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Gathering in Topeka, Kansas for the Educators’ Art of Facilitation Chapter IV
According to Alice Miller author of The Drama of the Gifted Child, an Enlightened Witness is “an understanding person who helps a victim of abuse recognize the injustice they suffered and gives vent to their feelings about what happened to them”. Brene Brown author of Daring Greatly states, "empathy is feeling with or alongside someone, while sympathy is feeling sorry for." https://youtu.be/1Evwgu369Jw In Topeka we unpacked and explored the message of the Enlightened Witnesses in our lives.
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Good Choices FEEL Good - An Early SEL Lesson from Grandma Boom / ORAEYC Blog
The little baby dinosaur was afraid to come out to play.....teaching empathy
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Healing ACE's
Healing Childhood Trauma I’d like to thank each member of ACE’s Connection for all your work helping and supporting children through various activities and organizations. You are clearly a collection of people who care about the children of the world. It is in recognition of these efforts that I ask you to consider two books on healing childhood trauma. They represent a life-time partnership dedicated to raising and educating healthy children. Secondly, I’d like to ask you for a word of...
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Here’s advice from a social worker on how schools can support transgender students right now [chalkbeat.org]
Soon after news broke that the Trump administration could further roll back civil rights protections for transgender students, one New York City teacher sent an email blast to her fellow educators. She was searching for materials to use in biology class that reflect people of different gender identities, but couldn’t find anything. Many city educators may similarly grapple with how to support transgender students after it was reported that the Trump administration is considering whether to...
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Schools Spotlight Social, Emotional Learning Amid Complex Times [fosters.com]
By Hadley Barndollar, Fosters.com, October 20, 2019 In a second-grade classroom at New Franklin Elementary School, a warm flurry of compliments. Seated in a circle, girls praise each other’s dresses and sweatshirts. A boy gives his friend kudos for helping him clean up after an activity the previous week. They all murmur the teacher-advised response — “thank you” — through toothy smiles. It’s a lesson on compliments. Down the hallway, in a first-grade circle, students talk about inclusion...
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Schools Spotlight Social, Emotional Learning Amid Complex Times [fosters.com]
By Hadley Barndollar, Fosters.com, October 20, 2019 In a second-grade classroom at New Franklin Elementary School, a warm flurry of compliments. Seated in a circle, girls praise each other’s dresses and sweatshirts. A boy gives his friend kudos for helping him clean up after an activity the previous week. They all murmur the teacher-advised response — “thank you” — through toothy smiles. It’s a lesson on compliments. Down the hallway, in a first-grade circle, students talk about inclusion...
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Self- Regulation Begins with Dogs, Tense Knots and Calm Socks
Self-Regulation Begins with Dogs, Tense Knots and Calm Socks Originally posted to ORAEYC, February 19, 2019 | Janai Mestrovich, M.S. We were all barking like dogs that were upset on all fours in the preK classroom. Then I used the Breathing Sphere to guide 20 preK children to take slow, deep belly button breaths to release the mad dog tension. As we all slowly exhaled and released the tight knots of tension, we were able to become calm dogs. The sounds of tense mad dogs had filled the room...
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Some 350 Florida Leaders Expected to Attend Think Tank with Dr. Vincent Felitti, Co-Principal Investigator of the ACE Study; Expert on ACEs Science
Leaders from across the Sunshine State will take part in a “Think Tank” in Naples, FL, on Monday, August 6, to help create a more trauma-informed Florida. The estimated 350 attendees will include policy makers and community teams made up of school superintendents, law enforcement officers, judges, hospital administrators, mayors, PTA presidents, child welfare experts, mental health and substance abuse treatment providers, philanthropists, university researchers, state agency heads, and...
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Spectrum Health Launches School-Based Telehealth Pilot Program (mhealthintelligence.com)
Michigan’s Spectrum Health is piloting a school-based telehealth program that aims to give rural high school students better access to telemental health services. Greenville Public Schools is partnering with the Grand Rapids-based health system to give students at the high school access to a Master’s-level social worker through a telemedicine portal. The counselor, working out of Spectrum Health’s Lakeview Youth Clinic, can schedule as many as a half-dozen virtual visits a day with students...
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SPLC's Teaching Tolerance Project: Social Justice Standards
I hope everyone is staying safe and sane during this heat wave! I wanted to share with you a tool that I came across from the Southern Poverty Law Center's Teaching Tolerance Project (if you have not had a chance to subscribe to their weekly newsletter , please do! It has a wealth of wonderful information that intersects with Resilience / Trauma Informed work) They also have a bunch of great free webinars ! Teaching Tolerance’s Social Justice Standards "Social Justice Standards: The Teaching...
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Take a deep breath: Koontz launches resiliency program to help kids cope with stress [Salisbury Post]
SALISBURY — They’re only 5, 6, 8, 10-years-old — but life has already thrown some elementary school students more punches than they can handle. Rowan County children walk into school every day with the scales stacked against them; bearing the weight of abuse, poverty or community violence — and when one more weight is added to the pile, they break. “The response could be fight or freeze, ” Christy Lockhart, a social worker at Koontz Elementary said. “ And it’s out of their control.”...
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'Teaching Hope': How California Schools Can Improve Ways To Address Student Trauma [capradio.org]
Dealing with students’ childhood trauma may improve classroom behavior and attendance rates — at least that’s the idea at the Los Angeles Unified School District’s wellness centers. They are located in or near schools, and are designed to serve kids impacted by issues such as deportation threats, domestic abuse, housing instability and other trauma. The district is working with local nonprofits to expand the program. Suzanne Markey is a social worker with the district. She said schools often...
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Texas Creates Task Force To Address Students’ Post-Harvey Trauma [houstonpublicmedia.org]
When the clouds darken and rain starts pouring down, many Houston-area elementary school students get nervous and start to sob — a sign of the long-lasting effects of watching the water levels rise during and after Hurricane Harvey. For Donna Wotkyns, a licensed social worker in Houston, that reaction shows exactly why ramping up resources for long-term mental health services for Texas students is necessary. “I’m a big believer in … support groups, getting together multiple children or youth...
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Mental Health In Schools: A Hidden Crisis Affecting Millions Of Students (npr.org)
You might call it a silent epidemic. Up to one in five kids living in the U.S. shows signs or symptoms of a mental health disorder in a given year. So in a school classroom of 25 students, five of them may be struggling with the same issues many adults deal with: depression, anxiety, substance abuse. And yet most children — nearly 80 percent — who need mental health services won't get them. Whether treated or not, the children do go to school. And the problems they face can tie into major...
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New Guidance on Trauma Screening in Schools
In partnership with the Defending Childhood State Policy Initiative and the National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice, new guidance has been released on trauma screening in schools. Importantly, this document lays out a series of important considerations when determining whether trauma screening is indicated in each context, and how to go about collecting and utilizing the data generated from the process. Please feel free to share input.
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Nowhere to Hide: The Elephant in the [Class]room
We are trying to scoop water out of a boat which has gaping trauma-holes in the bottom.
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Nowhere to Hide the Elephant in the [Class]room
Developmental trauma changes the architecture of the physical brain, ability to learn and social behavior. It impacts two out of three children, but I didn’t even know what it was…
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Bounce For Joy Project brings 'joy' to Chicago (abc7chicago.com)
CHICAGO (WLS) -- As a mother, Ronda Howard knows how important it is for kids to have something to do after school. "I was really volunteering in the schools and I saw and noticed that children were very angry and I wanted to come up with a program to help children have fun and release that anger," Howard said. So she created the Bounce For Joy Project with Dr. Dakeda Horton, a former social worker at the Cook County Juvenile Detention Center. The project is focused on teaching kids how to...
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CLICK FOR RESOURCES: TRAUMA-INFORMED EDUCATION
These trauma-informed education resources are linked to narrative illustrations of the same topic at LucidWitness.com. The narratives are designed to be used as 'Public Service Announcements' in social media, to help grow broad, general-public awareness of developmental trauma.
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Is Your School Ready to be Trauma Informed and Trauma Sensitive?
If you are like many teachers, social workers, or administrators in schools, you've been reading about the need for trauma informed care and trauma sensitive schools. Odds are you didn't need to read the research to know something that you were already seeing in your classrooms, school hallways, and community. Unfortunately reading about it, seeing the need, wanting to make changes, doesn't make the change happen. Five years ago, as the executive director of a school that needed to change, I...
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Kids Artwork - The Key to Communications & Goal Setting
Crayons can do wonders. Not just to make colorful rainbows and unicorns but as a vital tool used for communication between students and between the student and their teachers and parents. Janai Mestrovich (BS/MS, Family & Child Development, Ashland, OR) incorporates kid art into her SuperKid Power curriculum. Here are several examples from the kids (pre-K and Kindergarten) reflecting goals the kids said they were thinking about or that concerned them. in the first example, a young boy...
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Klaras Center agreement to place trauma professionals at Waco ISD alternative campuses [wacotrib.com]
A new one-year agreement between Waco Independent School District and the Klaras Center for Families - Heart of Texas Region MHMR will allow the school district to give more help to students who have experienced trauma than ever before. The $103,000 agreement approved by the district’s school board Sept. 29 will put a case worker and either a licensed professional counselor or a licensed clinical social worker on the Brazos High and Middle School Credit Recovery Center and the GL Wiley...
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LucidWitness: Increasing Public-Awareness of Developmental Trauma
LucidWitness blogposts are designed for social media to help grow awareness of developmental trauma among your network(s).
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The Relentless School Nurse: Candida Rodriguez is Creating Community Through the Power of Conversations That Matter
Candida Rodriguez is my mentor, while she may disagree with that statement and say it is the opposite, it is the absolute truth. My respect, admiration, and amazement at the depth of her knowledge, talent, and compassion astound me every time we work together. Candida serves her complex and ever-changing community with dedication, skill and a relentless pursuit of coordinating care for her students and families. We are partners in the Community Cafe Initiative that began in 2015 after I...
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The Year Without Graduation
This is the week the Governor of California called off the rest of the school year. Many states are following. This is not just the year of COVID. This is the year without graduation. That means 3.7 million high school seniors in the Class of 2020 are not going to wear their caps and gowns in May and June. Let me speak to you seniors if I may. (The rest of you should stay here, too. You need to get what they are losing). You began the year with senior photos. Sports for the last time for...
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Third Grader Learns Bullying Others Makes Him Feel Worse Inside
Teaching self and mutual respect to eliminate bullying