Umsl School Of Social Work Umsl S Hool Of So Ial

UMSL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORKUMSLSCHOOL OFSOCIALWORKSpring 2016NEWS FROM BELLERIVE HALLIN THIS ISSUEFOCUS ON: CollaborationWelcome to the Spring 2016 edition ofthe newsletter for the UMSL School ofSocial Work: Focus On Collaboration.Social work is inherently collaborativeby virtue of its mission to facilitate thewelfare of communities and theindividuals living within them, but thatcollaborative spirit is sometimesoverlooked as we insulate ourselveswithin our own work. For this reason,we decided to highlight just a few ofthe many ways the University ofMissouri’s School of Social Work isreaching out to our colleagues in otherdisciplines, other universities, inagencies across the St. Louis regionand the state of Missouri.The School of Social Work has beenawarded two training grants inconjunction with other universities.The SBIRT training grant was awardedto UMSL and Saint Louis University;The BHWET training grant wasawarded to UMSL and MU. In additionto these training grants, the Schoolengages in collaborative teachingacross and between UM campuses.The School is taking part in a UMinitiative to share courses across theentire UM system. The Schoolmaintains a presence in south centralMissouri by offering both its BSW andMSW degrees at Mineral Area Collegethrough the Off-Campus DegreeCompletion Program.Our field education program isentering its 16th year of collaborationwith area Social Work programs toeducate field instructors in agenciesthroughout the region. The Schoolcontinues to make an impact withcommunity partners in agencies allover the area. Collaborative Turns 15 .2SBIRT Training Grant .2BHWET . . . .3Collaborative Teaching . . .4Student Recognition 5Alumni News . . 7School of Social Work News . . 8

UMSL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK 2The St. Louis Field Education Collaborative Celebrates15 YearsWhen the UM system approved the Master of Social Work degree at UMSL in 2000, the system provided 40,000 to promote collaboration among the existing social work programs in St. Louis. At that time, thisincluded Washington University and St. Louis University. The deans and directors of these three programstogether decided to put that collaboration seed money toward field education and the St. Louis Field EducationCollaborative was born.READ MORE SBIRT: Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referralto TreatmentJoe Pickard, PhD, LCSW, associate professor of Social Work, recentlyreceived an 880,000 grant from the Substance Abuse Mental HealthServices Administration (SAMSA). Social Work Professor SharonJohnson is collaborating on the project, as are faculty at St. LouisUniversity. The grant was established to train social work students andfaculty in the relatively new screening tool referred to as Screening,Brief Interview, and Referral to Treatment, or SBIRT for short. SBIRTwas developed to provide early identification of and intervention toindividuals at risk of dangerous alcohol and drug use; many of theseindividuals would not be assessed as having a full-blown substancedisorder but could benefit from intervention nonetheless.READ MORE SBIRT consists of 3 components:Screening involves the assessmentfor risk of substance abuse usingstandardized screening tools.Brief Intervention engages a client ina collaborative conversation wherebyprovider gives feedback and advice.Referral to Treatment links a clientdeemed in need of additionaltreatment to appropriate resources.

3 UMSL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORKBHWET: Behavioral Health WorkforceEducation and Training ProgramThe Behavioral Health WorkforceEnhancement Training (BHWET) program isa collaborative effort between the Schools ofSocial Work at UMSL and Mizzou to trainmaster’s level social workers across the Stateof Missouri to work in identified integratedsettings with children, adolescents, andemerging adults as the targeted populations.Students who are trainees in the programreceive specialized coursework in integratedbehavioral health and have field placementsin primary care and behavioral healthsettings where the integrated approach isbeing implemented.The collaborative reach of the programsmeans that the social workers will be trainedin both urban and rural areas throughoutMissouri. The program facilitates sharedlearning opportunities through the UniversitySystem’s shared courses initiative. A coursein Integrated Health Policy is taught on theUMSL campus and is available online forstudents who attend Mizzou. IntegratedHealth Practice is taught on the Mizzoucampus and offered to UMSL studentsonline.Both sites are also working collaborativelywith community agencies to strengthenagencies’ infrastructure to provide integratedhealth care. UMSL also has an ongoingcollaborative relationship with St. LouisRegional System of Care, an agency that isworking to expand behavioral health servicesfor children ages 0-21 in St. Louis City and St.Louis County. This partnership supported arecent training event on the integratedhealth model tailored for MSW fieldinstructors. Speakers for the event includedDr. Heidi Miller of Family Care HealthCenters; Chardial Samuels of The Spot atJennings High School; and Dawn Prentice ofSt. Louis Behavioral Medicine Institute.The BHWET program is funded through a 3year grant from the Health Resources andServices Administration. UMSL facultyassociated with the grant includes Dr. SharonJohnson, Dr. ShaLai Williams, Dr. JoePickard, Dr. Baorong Guo, and ProfessorPatti Rosenthal. Professor Riisa Easley,Project Director for St. Louis RegionalSystems of Care, serves as adjunct instructor. Integrated Behavioral Health is defined by the US Department of Health & HumanServices as: The care a patient experiences as a result of a team of primary care andbehavioral health clinicians, working together with patients and families; This care may address mental health and substance abuse conditions, healthbehaviors (including their contribution to chronic medical illnesses), life stressorsand crises, stress-related physical symptoms, and ineffective patterns of healthcare utilization.

UMSL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK 4UM System Course Sharing InitiativeThe University of Missouri Systemrecently implemented an IntercampusCourse Sharing initiative to encouragethe sharing of courses amongst the fourUM System campuses. The idea insetting up the initiative was to givestudents at all campuses more optionsfor courses, provide support for facultywho may be on leave, and increasecourse offerings within academic units.Shirley Porterfield, associate professorof social work, taught a course in HealthCare Policy as a shared course this pastfall. 32 students were enrolled in theclass, about half coming from UMSL andhalf from MU. A professor at MU taughtthe affiliated practice course as a sharedcourse between the two campuses, aswell. Students from the differentcampuses were able to interact indifferent ways through the online course.According to Professor Porterfield, oneparticularly successful aspect of theshared course was the ability of studentsto ask and respond to questions fromclassmates, often with real-worldexamples of the material beingpresented. Porterfield said the broaderstudent demographic gave more urbanstudents an understanding of more ruralissues in social work and vice versa andled to a richer understanding of diverseperspectives and experiences.Shirley Porterfield,Associate Professor ofSocial WorkPorterfield is teaching the shared courseagain in the Fall semester of 2016. Nearly 80 MSW and BSW students and their professors traveled to Jefferson City on Wednesday, April 6thto participate in Empower Missouri’s annual Student Advocacy Day. UMSL students were able to put theiradvocacy and policy skills to practice. Students watched Senate and House floor debate, observedcommittee hearings, and met with legislators on a variety of social welfare issues.

5 UMSL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORKStudent RecognitionDistinguished Student AwardMSW Student Anna Boston (pictured right getting the award from ChristinaTroisi) was selected for the 2016 Social Work Leaders in Health Care of Metro St.Louis – Distinguished Student Award. This competition is among Master of SocialWork students, either full time or part time, who have a health related focus andare from one of the three MSW programs in St Louis. The Distinguished StudentAward consists of a check for 500 to be used at the student’s discretion, arecognition certificate, and a one year membership in the SWLHC.Anna Boston receiving theDistinguished Student AwardStudents Awarded TEGNA Foundation GrantAs part of their course in Human Service Organizations, Amy McKinney, Janelle Miller, andKelly Ragan applied for and were awarded a grant in the amount of 3450 from the TEGNAFoundation to renovate apartments for the Center for Women in Transition.Wednesday Club ScholarshipIn March, BSW student Crystal Johnson was awarded the St. Louis Wednesday Club scholarshipin the amount of 1400. Crystal describes the experience in her own words:Wednesday, March 2 was an amazing afternoon dining in Ladue, MO with the women of theWednesday Club of St. Louis. The club was founded in 1890 as a means for women tocontinue their intellectual growth through education, science, literature, arts, andphilanthropy.I was invited to attend as their guest of honor and recipient of the Wednesday Scholarship.The club members were very welcoming, celebratory, and inspiring as they cheered me on inmy future success. I was afforded an opportunity to speak before the group and expressed mygratitude by vowing to ‘pay it forward’ in my service.Crystal JohnsonDealing with the “Open Secret” of Campus RacismBSW Alum and current MSW student Robert Elam co-authored an articlethat appeared in Time’s Online Money Magazine about how to deal withracism on college campuses. Click headline to read the entire article.Robert Elam

UMSL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK 6Student RecognitionUMSL Graduate Research FairAnna Hall presented her research project,“A Systematic Review of EffectiveInterventions for reducing PTSDSymptoms in Refugees,” at the UMSLGraduate Research Fair. Her presentationwas awarded second place in the SocialScience and Business category.Anna Hall with her presentationWho’s Who Among StudentsFrom left to right: Rachel Hanks, Kathryn Deeken, andCelia McManus. (Not pictured: Matthew Fanning,Crystal Johnson, Kelley Moulton, and Marcus Woodson.)Seven students from the School of Social Work wererecognized at UMSL’s annual banquet honoring studentsfor inclusion in Who’s Who Among Students in AmericanUniversities and Colleges, an honor organization that datesback to 1934. Students are honored based on leadership,academic abilities, and community service. Honorees fromthe School of Social Work were Kathryn Deeken, MatthewFanning, Rachel Hanks, Crystal Johnson, Celia McManus,Kelley Moulton, and Marcus Woodson.Empower MissouriBSW student Patty Berger works as the Directorof Advocacy for Let’s Start, an organization thathelps women coming out of prison.She worked with Empower Missouri thislegislative session to get Executive Order 16-04passed, which Governor Nixon signed into lawon April 11th. This establishes the Fair ChanceHiring for state employment, which eliminatesthe question on state employment applicationsasking whether or not someone has a felony ontheir record. This is important for people comingout of prison because finding gainfulemployment is one major obstacle to theirsuccess.Patty Berger, second from the left, in Jefferson City with Gov. Nixon