April 2007 Children, Youth, and Families Interest Group Newsletter

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MICBlGAN CHILDREN, YOtJTR &FAMILIES

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGA·N SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK

INTEREST GaOUP

Volume 2, Issue I

let UI know what JOU think: • Contact the CY&f l"C!UP at nwcyf@umich:edu

The Children, Youth, and Families Interest Group Newsletter CY&F Feature: Professor Sean Joe

In November 2006, Assistant Professor of Social Work Sean Joe was featured in the

journal of the American Medical Association OAMA). His article,

Inside this Issue:

CY&F Feature: Professor Sean

Joe 2007 Collaboratory Preview

Dr. Kathleen Coulbom Faller Named Chair

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The Center for Excellence

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April 2007

" Prevalence of and Risk Factors for Lifetime Suicide Attempts Among Blacks in the United States," was the first known national study that provides information about the prevalence of attempted suicide among blacks.

In recent years, suicide and nonfatal suicidal behavior have emerged as crucial health issues for blacks, particularly older adolescents and young adults.

Significant differences were found based on gender, with suicide attempts more prevalent among women than men. The risk of a suicide attempt and risk of suicidal thoughts were significantly associated with being younger, having a low education level, residing in the Midwest region of the United States, and

having one or more psychiatric disorders.

The study's results indicate that clinicians who screen pa· tients for suicide risk should focus on risk facto rs such as anxiety and depression. Clinicians must also consider, when screening blacks. the strong association of psychiatric disorders with the risk for suicide attempts and the greater likelihood for young adults to be impulsive and for older adults to engage in plan ned suicide attempts.

On May I0 , 2007, from I0:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m .. the CY&F Interest Group will be sponsoring a collaboratory at the University of Michigan Detroit Center titled "Breaking the

silence: A community discussion on the rise of black youth suicide." Dr. Joe will highlight the rise in black suicide in our communities. He will be joined by community

Dr. Karen Staller l 2006 Collabora-

SAVE THE DATE CY&F Collaboratory May 10, 2007

toryRecap

Dr. Elizabeth Gershoff: Faculty Profile

leaders and agencies, including George Winn, chief clinical operating officer at the Children's Center of Detroit, and several panelists.

The number of suicide attempts in Detroit is higher than the national average. This collaboratory will bring together the broader community to engage in a discussion regarding what can be done about suicide prevention and intervention.

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I 0:00- 12:00 p.m . at The Detroit Center 3663 Woodward Ave. The Detroit Center

Detroit, Ml 4820 I

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On October 19, 2006, Professor Kathleen Faller was installed as the Marion Elizabeth Blue Endowed Professor in Children and Families. This chair is a gift of the Ann and Robert H. Lurie Family Foundation and is named after Ann Lurie's mother, Marion Elizabeth Blue.

In her address, Dr. Faller spoke of her vision for the professorship, particularly through the school's Center of Excellence in Children, Youth, and Families. She addressed the faculty's collaboration with the community, professionals, clients, the Guidance Center, and professional schools on cutting-edge issues. Funding is being sought for these collaborations and will include fellowships for Joint Doctoral Program students and doctoral students in postMSW practice.

Dr. Faller also announced the launching of two MSW child welfare fellowship programs: one for persons who have spent their childhood in the child welfare system and another for those committed to implementing the Indian Child Welfare Act and other federal child welfare statutes.

Dr. Faller hopes to enhance faculty involvement in the university's Family Assessment Clinic (FAC), of which she is director. Through collaboration between the Law School, Medical School, and School of Social Work (SSW), the FAC evaluates complex child maltreatment cases, conducts case record reviews, and provides treatment.

Right: School of Social Work Dean Paula Allen-Meares bestows the Blue Chair medal on Professor Faller.

THE CENTER FOR EXCELLENCE Partnership between the Guidance Center and the University of Michigan School of Social Work With the growing emphasis on empirically based practice in the field of social work, partnerships between researchers and social work agencies are becoming a necessity. Additionally, today's agencies are increasingly conscious of the rapid changes that are occurring within the field of social work and their impact on current treatment concepts. Agencies also recognize the need for developing this expertise within their agencies when they have the capacity to do so. It is through these developments in the social work landscape that the Guidance Center and the University of Michigan School of Social Work Center for Excellence was born.

The Center for Excellence is the cornerstone concept of the Guidance Center's vision for the future. The Guidance Center,

which was founded in 1958, serves more than I 1,000 individuals each year at its 22 locations. The focus of the Center for Excellence is evaluation and training, which are woven into all Guidance Center programs. In addition to program evaluation and training, the Center for Excellence is also designed to initiate new research among social work faculty and center staff, as well as internship opportunities for social work students in our MSW program.

Furthermore, the partnership provides new avenues for collaborative research and opportunities to pursue competitive funding for research and training. Several of the school's faculty members are pursuing such opportunities, including collaboration on infant mental health research and training opportunities, a federal children and youth

training grant, and evaluation of the Guidance Center's Even Start Family Literacy program.

Since its inception, the Center for Excellence has been directed by Deborah Willis, a graduate of the school's Joint Doctoral Program in Social Work and Sociology. The school's liaison to the Center for Excellence is Professor Michael Spencer, who also serves on the Guidance Center board of directors.

To learn more about the Guidance Center and its Center for Excellence, go to www.guidance-center.org.

Bottom Left: Professor Mike Spencer Bottom Right: Dr. Deborah Willis

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T~ E

GUIDANCE

CENTER

Strengthening fam Utes. Changing lives.

School of Social Work and Ozone House Collaboratory Recap The kickoff collaboratory-featuring Professor Karen M. Staller, faculty member from the University of Michigan School of Social Work, and Katie Doyle, CSW and associate director of Ozone House--was held at Trotter House in Ann Arbor on June 26, 2006. Approximately 40 people attended the event in which Professor Staller spoke about the significance of Ozone House, a pioneering program in the runaway and homeless youth shelter movement.

This presentation was based, in part, on research presented in Dr. Staller's book published by Columbia University Press entitled, Runaways: How the Sixties

Above: Professor Karen Staller

Left: Katie Doyle Right: Ozone House 1705 Washtenaw Ave. Ann Arbor, Ml 46104 734-662-2222

Counterculture Shaped Today's Praaices and Policies.

Ms. Doyle discussed the implications of Ozone House's historic roots for the way services are structured and delivered today and identified the constellation of services Ozone House currently offers youth. Ozone House remains a vibrant and important community service provider nearly 40 years after first opening its doors in Ann Arbor in 1969.

Faculty Profile: Professor Elizabeth Gershoff Elizabeth Gershoff joined the School of Social Work in the fall of 2004 after having spent five years as a research scientist at the National Center for Children in Poverty. She studies how parenting in general and discipline in particular affect children's development within contexts of poverty and low income, neighborhoods, schools, and culture.

Dr. Gershoff is principal investigator on a project funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to examine the dynamic effeets of income and material hardship on parents and children over time. From her work on this project, Dr. Gershoff recently published a paper in the interdisciplinary journal Child Development that confirmed two main pathways through which family income affects children.

First, parents who make more money are better able to buy more cognitively stimulating materials, such as books,

and provide enriching experiences, such as visits to museums, that support their children's academic achievement.

Second, the material hardship experienced by many lowincome families, such as not having enough to eat, can lead parents to be depressed and to fight with one another. This, in turn, can cause parents to show less affection toward their children, leaving the children depressed or more likely to misbehave.

By considering material hardship and family income together, the study's results challenge the well-established finding that family income is directly associated with parents' stress. Dr. Gershoff found that only when increases in income were associated with decreases in families' experiences of hardship did income alleviate parents' stress levels: income alone was not enough.

This distinction is important because the same level of family income can mean hardship

in some parts of the country, such as large, urban cities, but not in other areas, such as small, rural towns.

According to Dr. Gershoff, the results suggest that a goal of enhancing the cognitive abilities of children from lowincome families might be effectively served by interventions that provide such enriching materials or experiences when parents are financially unable to do so. If the goal is reducing behavior problems, then reducing hardship through provision of in-kind goods and services, and in turn reducing parent stress, may have the greatest impact.

This research was featured in the University Record and United Press International, from which it was picked up by several newspapers around the country and the world.

UNIVEllSITY OP MICHIGAN CHILDREN, YOUTH &FAMILIES

INTEREST GR.OUP

Univer$1ty of Mlchlpn School of Social Work 1080 S. University Ave.

Ann Arbor, Ml 48109-1106 Phone: 734-764-3309 Fax: 734-936-1961 sswqf@umich.edu

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK

University of Michigan School of Social Work

Children, Youth & Families Interest Group

If your agency is interested in participating in a collaboratory, please

Bringing academic research and community practice together

email sswcyf@umich.edu

The University of Michigan Board of Regents

Julia Donovan Darlow, Laurence B. Deitch, Olivia P. Maynard, Rebecca McGowan, Andrea Fischer Newman, Andrew C. Richner, S. Martin Taylor, Kat herine E. White