April Ferguson LCSW-C, Senior Practice Associate: Children and Adolescents In October 2024, NASW Senior Practice Associate, April Ferguson, participated in the Center for American Progress 10th National Gun Violence Prevention Summit as a panelist in a morning...
School social workers are integral part of safety strategy
The benefits of school-based mental health services have been supported in prior research and literature. Studies have shown that approximately one in five youths in schools today have diagnosable mental health disorders. However, research has identified that close to...
The Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung conceptualized the idea of “wounded healers” to refer to helping professionals who experience personal challenges that affect their work. Jung proposed that the physician who has experienced adversity is better equipped to understand...
Researchers have noted that mental health professionals constantly exposed to clients’ traumatic experiences can themselves develop negative effects, such as vicarious trauma, secondary traumatic stress, or compassion fatigue. These psychological and physical effects...
There are many challenges that face children who age out of the foster care system, including education, housing, and health care. One rarely-addressed challenge is oral health care. Children who have aged out of the foster care system face considerable barriers in...
Each year in the United States, nearly 400,000 students drop out of public high school. Among high school graduates, approximately one-third complete no postsecondary education or training. Of those who do, many are unprepared. Forty percent of four-year and 63...
Social work is such a broad field, encompassing micro-, mezzo-, and macro-practice, that it can feel like it lacks a unifying professional identity. What are the underlying values and concepts of social work that delineate the profession, and how can these values and...