Dear WestCoast Community,
As part of our continued efforts to advocate for an improved statewide response to the commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) in California, WestCoast participated in a California Senate Committee on Human Services Hearing this past Tuesday. The hearing brought together leaders from the multiple systems that serve CSEC to educate policymakers on the complexities and challenges of protecting and serving sexually exploited youth. Continue reading
Alea Holman presented 3 papers at the American Educational Research Association(AERA) conference in April. They are: Catalysts and Challenges to Gendered Racial Socialization in Black Families; Before the Bell Rings: Black Families’ Efforts to Support their Children’s Educational Excellence; and African American Parents’ Experiences with Schools: How a Community-Based Program can Strengthen Family-School Relationships.
Jonathan Fishman presented A Phenomenological Investigation of Meta-emotions of First Generation Asian Indian Immigrant Mothers as part of a panel entitled Parental Socialization of Emotion and Values: Variation Across Ethnic Groups in North America on April 20th at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development in Seattle.
Dear WestCoast Community,
April is Child Abuse Prevention Month and Sexual Assault Awareness Month. For commercially sexually exploited youth, these issues are combined. The WestCoast approach to raising awareness is to combine knowledge with action and advocacy. This week we’ll be in Sacramento to urge legislators to pass a bill that WestCoast and other advocates have crafted: SB 738: Sexually Exploited and Trafficked Minors. Continue reading
Dear WestCoast Community,
As part of our ongoing efforts to improve the services, systems and public policies that impact the lives of commercially sexually exploited children (CSEC), WestCoast has been participating as a member of the California Child Welfare Council’s Commercially Sexually Exploited Children Workgroup. The workgroup’s final product, the report described below, will be presented to the full Council next Wednesday, March 6th. Continue reading
Training Assessors in Therapeutic Assessment by Marianne E. Haydel, Barbara L. Mercer, and Erin Rosenblatt was recently listed as one of the top ten cited articles from the Journal of Personality Assessment. The article focuses on the use of the comprehensive Therapeutic Assessment training model (Finn, 2007) with a child and his mother, and offers ideas about learning and training in the context of the case presented. You can access the article at this link.
Dear WestCoast Community:
These past few days our thoughts have been with the children, families, and staff of Sandy Hook Elementary School, as well as the residents of Newtown, as they face the enormity of Friday’s aftermath. Continue reading
We are pleased to announce the release of WestCoast’s first research brief, “Research to Action: Sexually Exploited Minors Needs and Strengths.”
The disturbing underground industry that thrives on selling children for sex is an alarming and complex problem that has no simple solution. But we’re dedicated to doing what it takes to end child sexual exploitation. Continue reading
published in the Journal of Personality Assessment Volume 94, Issue 3, 2012
by Audrey Rosenberg, Angelica Almeida & Heather Macdonald, WestCoast Children’s Clinic, Oakland, California
This article examines cross-cultural therapeutic assessment in a community mental health clinic. The first case describes the work between a Caucasian assessor and a Mexican American family. The authors explore the metaphorical and literal translation of the findings from English to Spanish and the parallel process of translation of the self, experienced by both assessor and client. The second case describes the work between a Caucasian assessor and an African American adolescent. We describe the inherent challenge between the Eurocentric “task” orientation of the evaluation and the Afrocentric “relationship” orientation. We suggest that bridging the gap between cultures and overcoming cultural mistrust lay in the building of the assessor–client relationship. Fischer’s concepts of rapport and intimacy are emphasized and expanded on as we emphasize the importance of cocreated meaning in cross-cultural assessment work.
Visit the publisher’s website for access to the full article.
published in Journal of Personality Assessment Volume 93, Issue 1
by Brooke Guerrero, Jessica Lipkind, and Audrey Rosenberg, WestCoast Children’s Clinic
Although the majority of research on Therapeutic Assessment (TA) discusses the application of TA in research or private practice settings, we found that the model could be applied in a community mental health setting. We argue that when implementing this model with racially diverse, low socioeconomic status children, it is essential to integrate issues of class, privilege, and race into the assessment process. A case is presented that illuminates the specific concerns and struggles of adapting this model to a community psychology population. This analysis includes the interface with systems, placement stability, and consideration of culturally responsible treatment. We also demonstrate how the support of a treatment team helps the individual clinician process and integrate the levels of trauma and pain with which these families present.