Evaluating Group Work within a Summer Camp Intervention for Children and Adolescents with Asthma

Findings suggest that residential camps and group work within camps are highly valued by children and their parents. Children predominantly valued recreational and educational aspects of camp programming whereas parents emphasized appreciation for the safety that a condition-specific camp can offer a child with illness. Within the camp program, group work and peer support were integrally provided along with clinical monitoring and health teaching. A psychoeducational approach was implemented in which group participants engaged in sessions addressing self-care strategies and constructive ways to integrate childhood asthma in daily life. Participants identified the residential camp setting as a promising environment for group work among children and adolescents with asthma. Implications and recommendations are discussed.     

A Worker's Personal Grief and Its Impact on Processing a Group's Termination

SUMMARY

This article deals with a worker struggling with a personal loss while simultaneously helping her group with the termination of a valued long term member. The focus is on the parallel grieving process and the resistance to mourning.     

Colorful Disclosures: Identifying Identity-Based Differences and Enhancing Critical Consciousness in Supervision

ABSTRACT

Managing microaggressions and marginalizing experiences while negotiating the ongoing oppression that occurs in micro, mezzo, and macro settings can be particularly challenging for clinicians of color. Thus, supervision with clinicians of color must include affirmation, empowerment, and exploration of the intracultural/intercultural dynamics inherent in the treatment-providing process and clinical supervision. Through case studies, autoethnographic studies of our supervision experiences, and interviews with supervisors and supervisees, we reflect on how axes of identity, including race, power, and privilege, inform practitioners’ clinical lenses and affect their vulnerability in treatment and the clinical supervision dyad. Special attention is placed on the clinical supervisor–clinician–client triad (the triple process) and the interpersonal dynamics of cultural sensitivity, cultural humility, and authentic responsiveness that supervisors aim to model and cultivate in the supervisory relationship. In addition to sustaining clinical growth for clinicians of color, adding this level of complexity to supervision supports equity in direct clinical practice, enhancing efficacy outcomes for clients and communities. Recommendations and pedagogical strategies are offered to support supervisors in initiating difficult dialogues and shifting the paradigm to promote this transformational perspective.     

The Meaning of Camp and Social Group Work Principles

SUMMARY

The paper examines the experience of campers at a summer residential camp in relation to principles of group work practice that are incorporated into the camp program. Through the use of examples and stories from campers, six different principles are discussed in relation to their meaning to campers. All of the practice principles discussed are applicable to other recreational, residential, and educational settings.     

The Transformation of the Purpose of a School-Based Supervision Group during Tough Economic Times: Challenges and Considerations for the Worker

This article describes the dramatic change in purpose in a group supervision that was faced with an economic crisis. For 7 years the group flourished, providing clinical and emotional support for social work staff and interns. During a time of economic hardship, the program faced the threat of closing, and, in response the group transformed itself from a clinical supervision group to a social-action task group. This article details the trajectory and transformation of the group's focus from clinical supervision to social action with a special emphasis on (1) group supervision, (2) social action, and (3) the concept of purpose in group work. The complexities, consequences, surprises, and rewards of this process, especially for the group worker, are described. The creative use of supervision groups and worker flexibility and self awareness are discussed.     

Use of Contemporary Film as a Medium for Teaching an Online Death and Grief Course

Online education is becoming commonplace in the academic world. Schools now offer totally online degree programs or provide a hybrid of face-to-face and online courses for fulfilling academic requirements. Developing courses and teaching online requires instructors to rethink the educational paradigms they have relied upon in the past. The Net Generation of learners brings a different set of expectations, styles, and needs to the classroom than those of previous generations; this mandates that instructors redesign courses and use contemporary teaching modalities. This article describes how film was successfully used as the primary medium to teach a graduate online Social Work course, Death and Grief.     

Residential institutions requesting supervision: a theoretical analysis of an empirically studied problem

This study was based on vague but persistent problems of uncertain origin permeating treatment and care in Swedish residential institutions treating emotionally disturbed and socially disadvantaged children. The purpose was to generate a reliable, empirically grounded theory, sufficient to describe and explain these problems, which were first observed in supervisory sessions. The main methods used were grounded theory ( Glaser & Strauss 1967 ; Strauss & Corbin 1990 , 1998 ) and abduction ( Peirce 1914/1990 ; Fann 1970 ; Josephson & Josephson 1996 ). During a three-year period, 17 respondents from three strategically chosen institutions were individually interviewed twice. The results suggest that artificial family institutions , enjoying family privileges , may develop out of family ideas . Under certain conditions, such institutions may be transformed into non-professional institutions that fail to carry out their official task, but that instead effect unconscious psychological tasks – tasks that are both hidden behind and obstruct the institution's official mission. The possibility of avoiding this development is dependent partly on the quality of the emotional content, called the need for reparation , within the institution, and partly on the methods used to control this need. This notion was tested in practice in a separate part of the study in which the method action-cum-research ( Trankell 1973 ) was used. One of the studied institutions was then observed for two years during a process of planned change in organization, treatment routines and attitudes. After two years, the final resistance to the official task had disappeared, and the former non-professional institution now worked in a task-orientated manner. This result has broad implications for planning and support of care institutions, as the same phenomena might arguably occur in any care organization.     

Dilemmas in Creating an Intern/Field Instructor Supervision Group in a School Setting: Thoughts on Role and Authority

ABSTRACT

Being guests in a host system, a school-based health program (SBHP), presents social workers with complex challenges that underscores the need for regular, supportive supervision. Group supervision is especially useful in bridging this gap, reducing isolation, and uniting a social work team dispersed across four different schools. This article reports on efforts to strengthen a social work component in a four-unit SBHP through the creation of a bi-weekly supervision group. Due to the hierarchical mixed membership of field instructors, interns and program administrator, this group addressed challenges and opportunities around role, authority, and power dynamics.     

A Pedagogical Model of Clinical Supervision of Adolescents as Therapeutic Caretakers for Children and Each Other

This article describes a model of supervision provided to adolescents who function as therapeutic “caretakers” with children in a unique neighborhood community mental health organization located in the South Bronx. Rooted in theories of community mental health, social support, and pedagogy, the article describes the recruitment process, training, and supervision given to the organization's adolescent “caretakers” to ensure that they will develop the attitudes and skills needed in their therapeutic interactions with children. Particular emphasis is placed on “in vivo” supervisory processes derived from the organization's pedagogical model. The model's usefulness is not limited to training adolescent therapeutic caretakers and is readily applicable to training professional or nonprofessional helpers in a variety of settings (e.g., collaborative partnerships with schools and community agencies where personnel are trained to serve directly or in an auxiliary role as therapeutic change agents).