Development of Consultants By Laura Borish

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1 Inside this Issue: Pages 1 and 2 Development of Consultants Page 3 Program Development Update-Juvenile Justice Page 3 Welcome to The Training Program Page 4 Winter Weather Policy Page 5 Supervisor Overlay of Charting the Course Page 5 New Pilots Page 6 On the Website Page 7 Don t Forget Page 7 Have You Updated Your Contact Information Lately Development of Consultants By Laura Borish Seven highly skilled professionals participated in the Development of Consultant training at the Child Welfare Training Program in Mechanicsburg on October 16 and 17, The group worked with Practice Improvement Specialists Jerry Sopko and Laura Borish to learn about consulting techniques, the organizational effectiveness process used by the Training Program with Child Welfare organizations, the major initiatives and programs we support, and the Regional Team approach to serving Pennsylvania s counties. Each participant was provided a copy of our Organizational Effectiveness Guide: A Resource for Technical Assistance and Consulting, a compilation of tools which may be used in the assessment, planning, implementation, evaluation and monitoring phases of work with agencies. On the second day of the training, George Taylor, an experienced human services consultant, shared his vast knowledge about the ins and outs of being a consultant. Lynn Keltz, Practice Improvement Unit Lead, and Pam Cordero, Fiscal Specialist, provided information about our contracting and invoicing processes. Calvin Kulik, Practice Improvement Specialist, provided an overview of transfer of learning services that we are able to provide to counties in conjunction with training. 1

2 Development of Consultants (continued): We welcome our new class of consultants to the Pennsylvania Child Welfare Training Program. We look forward to working with you as you assist public Child Welfare agencies to improve practices to better serve children, youth, and families in the areas of safety, permanency and well-being. In the photo from left to right are new consultants; Mary Onama, Joanne Gitto Davis, Bob Isaacson, Dave Harvey, Betsy Emling, Angel Zang, and Jeff Dykstra. 2

3 Program Development Update Juvenile Justice By Marsha Lynch The Child Welfare Training Program recently entered into a partnership with the Bureau of Juvenile Justice Services (BJJS). BJJS provides oversight for the Youth Development Center / Youth Forestry Camp (YDC/YFC) system. The YDC/YFC was created in 1958 and was charged with providing social services and residential programming for the rehabilitation of delinquent youth. The YDC/YFC system has the capacity to serve over 600 residents and employs over 900 staff. There are seven facilities located across the state of Pennsylvania. The goal of the partnership is to develop Professional Development Certificate Programs for staff working in the YDC/YFC system. Over the next several months, the Child Welfare Training Program will be concentrating on developing a certificate track in the area of Clinical Counseling but the project also includes certificate programs in the areas of Mental Health, Substance Abuse, Mental Retardation and Learning Disabilities. Each of the identified areas will include training for line, counseling, and administrative staff. Welcome to the Training Program The Training Program would like to welcome Susan Grove. Susan is the new Administrative Assistant for the Fiscal and Operations Department. She is responsible for preparing the meeting and training rooms, maintaining the mail and supply room, ordering supplies and keeping the copy room stocked. Susan will assist on special projects as needed and will also be the Library Coordinator and backup for the receptionist. Susan can be reached at (717) x 297 or ssg15@pitt.edu. 3

4 Winter Weather Policy By Brandie Gilbert As winter weather has approached, the question was raised Will my training be cancelled? The Training Program has developed the following guidelines to assist us in making the decision to cancel or not to cancel a workshop. Anticipated Inclement Weather Policy: The Training Delivery Specialist will contact the trainer 48 hours prior to the scheduled workshop to discuss the issue of possible inclement weather, or Friday for a Monday workshop. If the Trainer is anticipating inclement weather and has not been contacted by the Training Delivery Specialist please contact the Specialist as soon as possible. The Trainer and the Training Delivery Specialist together will make the decision on whether to cancel the workshop. If the workshop is cancelled, the Training Delivery Specialist will call the participants to notify them of the cancellation. Emergency Inclement Weather Policy: The Trainer is responsible for contacting the Training Delivery Specialist no later than 6:00 AM the day of the scheduled workshop to cancel the workshop due to inclement weather. If you need to cancel a workshop due to inclement weather, please call o Training Delivery Specialists will be on an on-call rotation to handle emergency weather situations. o The Training Delivery Specialist will then put a message on The Training Program s voic indicating the cancellations for the day. If a Charting the Course module is cancelled due to weather, the Training Delivery Specialist will contact the participating counties to reschedule on a per module basis. The remaining modules will go on as scheduled. 4

5 Supervisor Overlay of Charting the Course Are you interested in learning more about Charting the Course? The Training Program offers a Supervisor Overlay for Charting the Course, which is a six hour workshop designed to teach Child Welfare Supervisors what they need to know about Charting the Course so they can provide educational and supportive supervision to their new caseworkers. The goal of this training is for supervisors to be able to use the parallel process to demonstrate the knowledge, skills, awareness and values taught in Charting the Course. Supervisor Overlay is being offered as listed below over the next few months: January 25, 2008 at the Monroeville Training Room March 18, 2008 at the Williamsport Training Room April 15, 2008 at the Child Welfare Training Program in Mechanicsburg April 16, 2008 at the Meadville Training Room May 21, 2008 at the Cambria County Children and Youth Training Room If you are interested in attending this workshop, please contact Rachael Ickes at to register. New Pilots The following curricula have been completed and will be piloted in the near future: Childhood Mental Health Issues: An Introduction for Child Welfare Professionals (revised) Childhood Mental Health Issues: Application to the Casework Process Using Ethics to Guide Casework & Decision Making Integrating Concurrent Planning into Casework Practice Please look for these Trainer Opportunity letters in the near future. 5

6 On the Website Below you will find a link to our website where you can view current job postings. The website address is The current job posting is: Administrative Assistant in the Curriculum Department Below you will find a link to our website where you can view pilots and special events. The website where you can find more information about these events is The current special events listed are: January 30, 2008 Overview of Child Welfare Service Provider Contracting Pilot in Mayfield April 30, 2008 Diversity Task Force Annual Training Event June 26, 2008 Trainer and Consultant Event This website has been updated to include links to all members of the Training Delivery Department. The links can be found under Training Delivery-Training Delivery Organizational Chart. Just click on the name you were looking for and you will be able to that person. The website has also been updated to include Trainer Facility Guides for all of our Training Facilities. 6

7 If you have a question or concern and need to reach someone in the Training Delivery Department please call and someone will be able to assist you. Just a friendly reminder that all trainers and consultants need to sign beside the participants on the sign-in sheet for participants to get credit for the training. If you notice a problem with a DVD or video that was sent with a curriculum you were training please return the DVD or video with a note on it stating what the problem was so the Training Delivery Department can fix the problem. Thank you for your attention to this issue. Have you Updated your Contact Information Lately? It is important for the Pennsylvania Child Welfare Training Program to have the most up-to-date contact information. We use this information to send your trainer boxes, contact you for the scheduling of trainings, contracts, and correspondence you receive from the Training Program. If you have any changes or are not sure what information we may have, please feel free to contact Jennifer Kerr at or her at jlm69@pitt.edu. Thanks to the Following Palette Contributors Laura Borish Brandie Gilbert Susan Grove Jennifer Kerr Marsha Lynch Claudia Witmer 7