Transgender youth are those whose genders do not align with their sex assigned at birth. Transgender youth are increasingly visible and frequently encounter discrimination and a lack of understanding from others, especially at school. As a result, they experience profound mental health challenges, with one in five transgender youth attempting suicide. However, such youth who are adequately supported do not experience serious mental health difficulties. Accordingly, promoting school support for transgender youth is critical. While school staff know how to help youth generally, many want more guidance on how to help transgender youth. However, few resources provide clear and actionable best practices for school staff to help transgender youth.
Best practices for supporting transgender youth in schools include verbal, behavioral, and visual skills that all school staff can use. Research shows that when these practices are used, transgender youth experience fewer mental health challenges, feel more connected to their school community, and do better academically.
There are at least 20 best practices for supporting transgender youth in schools supported by empirical and practice-based literature; they span four categories: (a) language to use and avoid, (b) coming out at school, (c) creating a supportive school environment, and (d) preventing and intervening in bullying. Examples include sharing pronouns, advocating for, and sharing the location of gender-inclusive facilities, and intervening in gender-based bullying. School staff—including school social workers—can and should use this set of easy-to-implement, research-informed best practices to improve transgender youths’ mental health.
Article
Best Practices for Supporting Transgender Youth in Schools
Patrick Mulkern, August Wei, and Maggi Price
Article
Child Protection
Brett Drake and Melissa Jonson-Reid
All children require a safe and nurturing environment for optimal development. Child maltreatment is among the most serious societal problems, with severe behavioral, health, and economic costs. Preventing and responding to child maltreatment is therefore among the most critical services a society can provide. Child protection in the United States is handled by many agencies in a general sense, including law enforcement and health departments. The main agency tasked with protecting children is the Child Protective Services (CPS) system, which is charged with supporting the safety and well-being of children who may be at risk of child maltreatment. Child maltreatment is a common societal problem, with various national studies suggesting that up to a third of children may experience maltreatment before turning 18. CPS contacts about 4% of all children in the United States each year. Among children contacted, about one fifth are substantiated and a very small proportion of all children reported are placed in foster care. CPS serves poor persons at higher rates than wealthier persons, consistent with the higher need for protection faced by those under economic stress. Similarly, Black children are contacted by CPS at a rate almost twice that of White children, consistent with increased risks and stressors faced by that population, largely associated with historical and current racism, particularly as manifested in economic racial stratification. Child welfare practice innovations include, among other things, the increased use of “differential response” programs, in which situations presenting fewer safety risks are handled with less emphasis on investigation, and an increased awareness of the need for preventative services, including services aimed at supporting those under severe economic stress.
Article
Maternal Mental Health
Suresh Jungari
Maternal mental health (MMH) concerns encompass perinatal or postnatal fear of childbirth and any stress during pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period. Maternal mental health issues have not received sufficient attention in research discourse, especially in low- and middle-income countries. The prevalence of maternal mental health problems ranges from 10% to 35% in both developed and developing countries. Individual, reproductive-related, and community-level factors contribute to increasing MMH concerns. Maternal mental health conditions may lead to compromised quality of life, delayed child development, loss of employment, and financial burdens. Routine maternal healthcare has been found to lack of integration of mental health aspects. Health systems should be equipped to address maternal mental health problems during routine maternal healthcare. More efforts are also needed in conducting research on varied dimensions of MMH.
Article
Special Education
Annahita Ball and Candra Skrzypek
The special education system in the United States serves youth with disabilities in the public schools. After decades of marginalization and oppression, federal and state policies established in the 1970s created a complex policy and service delivery system that serves more than 15% of youth in schools. Under federal law, disabled youths are entitled to a free and appropriate public education (FAPE) in the least restrictive setting. At the federal level, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is the guiding policy for special education. Under IDEA, key features of special education include the identification and evaluation of disabled youths, the least restrictive environment, Individualized Education Plans (IEP), procedural safeguards, and shared decision-making. To be eligible for services, a youth’s disability must directly and adversely impact their education as demonstrated by a comprehensive evaluation. Following the evaluation, a student will receive an educational placement in the least restrictive environment meaning the student must be included with students who are nondisabled to the maximum extent possible. The student will also receive an IEP, or a written document that specifies how the school or district will provide FAPE for the student as well as measurable annual goals. Students and their families should be involved throughout this process, and procedures are in place to ensure that any disputes are resolved.
Vast inequities and disproportionalities have been identified within the special education system. Specifically, inequity spans the identification, evaluation, and discipline of youths with disabilities. Some youths are overidentified in special education, while others are underidentified. Black, Native, and Hispanic youths are more likely to be identified for special education services and are more likely to be placed in restrictive and segregated settings. Disabled youths, especially racialized youths, are also at increased risk of exclusionary discipline (e.g., suspensions and expulsions). Policy changes identify and rectify disproportionality in special education. States and districts are required to report on disproportionality and those that have significant disproportionality by race or ethnicity must provide early intervening services to eliminate the disproportionality. Debate persists on whether the current special education system can truly be equitable though continued advocacy, policy changes, and innovation to ensure that special education practices meet the needs of all students.
Article
Mental Health: Adolescents
Craig Winston LeCroy
Health care practitioners frequently ignore mental health problems in teens. Adolescents’ daily functioning may be hampered as they mature and are exposed to more dangerous settings. The common behavioral and mental health issues that teenagers face is critical to understanding how to best offer prevention and intervention services. Teenage mental health treatment often focuses on developing functional abilities and identifying models of care that can lessen dysfunctional symptomatology. The latest approaches to treating and preventing teenage mental health issues are presented. The mental health field has placed increased focus on implementing evidence-based treatments. In addition to treatment models, numerous additional elements must be taken into account while developing or implementing treatment.
Article
Home Visits and Family Engagement
Barbara Wasik and Donna Bryant
The importance of engaging families in home visiting was recognized more than a century ago as M. E. Richmond provided guidelines for involving families in the visiting process. She stressed individualizing services and helping families develop skills that would serve them after the home visiting services ended. During the 20th century, early organized efforts in home visiting in the United States built on methods used in other countries, especially European countries. Although interest fluctuated in the United States during the past century, since 2010 interest has increased due primarily to the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act that provided for home visiting services to respond to the needs of children and families in order to improve health and development outcomes for vulnerable children and their families.
Engaging families is essential for a productive home visiting experience requiring thoughtful program activities as well as knowledge and skills on the part of the visitor. Program responsibilities begin with the need to make good employment decisions regarding home visitors and then to provide effective training, supervision, and ongoing professional development. Providing professional training in helping skills such as observation, listening, and ways of asking questions to gain or clarify information is essential to ensure visitors can engage families. Using principles for effective home visiting—including establishing a collaborative relationship with the family; individualizing services; being responsive to family culture, language, and values; and prompting problem-solving skills—can enhance the ability of the visitor to engage the family. Programs can provide opportunities for visitors to enhance their skills in developing relationships with and engaging families. Engaging families is a reciprocal process. Some families will have a positive orientation toward working with visitors to accomplish their own goals and objectives; others may be less willing to engage. Although the program and visitors have the main responsibility for engagement, they will face challenges with some families and may need to seek creative solutions to actively engage.
Just as home visitors need to engage parents in order to facilitate new knowledge and skills, parents need to engage their children to foster development. Recent research identified a set of parent–child interactions that visitors can incorporate to foster parent engagement with young children. These challenges are shared across home visit programs, as well as across cultures and countries, regardless of the professional training of the visitors or the goals and procedures of the programs.
Article
Sayles, Odessa
David Cory and Catheleen Jordan
Odessa Sayles, MSW, was a leading advocate for adoption of Black children by Black families in Houston, Texas, during the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. She was well known for dedicating her life to children and to uplifting the Black community. Serving as lead program director for foster care and adoptions for Harris County Protective Services for Children, she was steadfast in seeking culturally appropriate homes for children facing adoption.
Article
Culturally Responsive Practice With African American Youth
Husain Lateef and Dominique Horton
Although scholars in the applied social sciences and allied professions have paid increasing attention to many of the disparities experienced by African American youth, very few efforts have been made to increase awareness of how culturally responsive practice can inform prevention and intervention efforts with this population. In response, the authors present an overview of cultural factors among African American youth, including information on their ancestral heritage, language, and known findings from culturally responsive interventions, to establish guideposts for next steps required to advance practice within social work. Subsequently, the authors conclude by sharing implications for continued research with communities and preliminary steps for social work practitioners that work with African American youth and their families.
Article
Racial Disparities in the Child Welfare System
Alan J. Dettlaff
Racial disproportionality and disparities have been documented in the child welfare system in the United States since at least the 1960s, yet they persist as a national problem. This article provides an overview of the history of racial disproportionality and disparities in child welfare systems, the continuing presence of racial disproportionality and disparities, and the factors that contribute to racial disproportionality and disparities. The article concludes with strategies that have been developed over the years to address racial disproportionality and disparities, including calls for abolition of the child welfare system as a means of addressing these persistent problems.
Article
Deinstitutionalization in Macro Practice
Steven P. Segal
The deinstitutionalization policy sought to replace institutional care for populations in need of care and control with prosocial community-based alternatives. U.S. institutional populations, however, have increased since the policy’s inception by 205%. As implemented, with the assistance of advocacy and cost-cutting factions, it has succeeded only in enabling the divestiture of state responsibility for target groups. It sought to prevent unnecessary admission and retention in institutions. As implemented, deinstitutionalization initiated a process that involved a societal shift in the type of institutions and institutional alternatives used to house its target groups, often referred to as trans-institutionalization. For many in need of institutional placements, it has succeeded in preventing all admissions, expanding admissions for others. In seeking to develop community alternatives for housing, treating, and habilitating or rehabilitating its target groups, it has succeeded in establishing a variety of alternative living arrangements and showcase and model programs illustrating what can be done; yet, it has failed to deliver on investments in such programs to serve the majority of its target groups. It has resulted in the abandonment of substantial numbers to homelessness. It has been documented, from political, economic, legal, and social perspectives, how this policy has affected the care and control of populations such as older adults, children, people with mental illness or developmental disabilities, people under correctional-system supervision, and, more recently, individuals without a home. Suggestions for a truer implementation of deinstitutionalization’s initial aspirations are available.
