Course Description:
For Specialty Practice Members Only
Two overarching problems emerge from recent survey data on American school social workers’ (SSW) practice: most SSW report that they spend little time engaging in school-based family counselling (SBFC), focusing instead on individual student concerns without family and teacher involvement; and few SSW report feeling prepared to conduct their practice in an evidence-informed and data-driven manner (Kelly et al., 2016). This presentation will describe three Professional Learning Community (PLC) training and research projects currently underway at Loyola Chicago’s Family and School Partnership Program (FSPP) that are attempting to address the gap between the best practices called for in the SSW literature and what is happening in the field. The PLC projects (in Ontario, Canada, Chicago, and suburban Detroit, for a total n=95) all participated in a year-long PLC related to enhancing evidence-informed, data-driven and prevention practices in their context, with a mixture of online and in-person training. Preliminary results from each of the three PLC projects indicate that there are a range of effective low-cost, self-help strategies that can bolster the skills and knowledge SSW need to engage in SSW best practices. Specific tools from these projects will be offered, as well as an opportunity to deepen and extend the learning from the webinar on Dr. Kelly’s website, www.schoolsocialwork.net
Course Link:
https://www.socialworkers.org
CE Value (credits): 1
CE Type: Standard
Sponsor Name:
National Assn. of Social Workers
Contact Information:
Rochelle Wilder
202-336-8369
mailto:rwilder.nasw@socialworkers.org