Crisis Nursery Interview, Essay Example

Safe Harbor Crisis Nursery and Family Support Center opened its doors on November 8^th, 2001 with the mission to care for children with documented abuse and neglect. The center has received numerous accolades for its work including the State Social Work Agency of the Year award from the Washington chapter of the National Association of Social Workers (Safe Harbor Crisis Nursery).

My point of contact at Safe Harbor Crisis Nursery and Family Support Center was Case Manager, Jenny Jewell. Jenny informed me that Safe Harbor understands different people may have different needs or require different kind of intervention that is why the center has different programs. The first one is Taming the Dragons which is aimed at children 18 months to 10 years of age. This program helps them learn calming and soothing techniques as well as coping mechanisms to deal with trauma. The second program is Dragon Slayers which is same as Taming the Dragons but aimed at teens 10 to 18 years of age.

The third program is Trauma Academy which educates the participants on the trauma including causes of trauma, treatment of trauma, and coping mechanisms. The fourth program is The Incredible Years which is an education program for the family. The Incredible Years is further divided into two components which are the infant/toddler program (pregnancy- 2 years) and the basic program for 3-8 years and up. The center also provides a 3 week trauma class for professionals as well as a 4 hour seminar for families going through separation/divorce in order to help them create a parenting plan. Jenny specifically mentioned that the center will provide service to everyone except sex offenders because they are prohibited to do so as a requirement of their operating licence.

The center carries out comprehensive background checks on all internship applicants who also go through a training program before resuming their responsibilities. The job applicants also have to meet the minimum age requirement of 21. The center operates with absolute autonomy from any outside interference in order to ensure all employees are able to withhold the highest ethical standards. Jenny added that fortunately, she has never faced any ethical dilemma at her job and it is not surprising because human services profession cannot survive without strict ethical standards and respect for merit and professional competency.

Expressing her personal opinions on the state of human services profession, Jenny suggested that human services programs should aim for long term resolutions rather than short term solutions. Jenny also believed that many organizations provide the same services and compete with each other which is a waste of scarce resources. A better alternative may be to consolidate operations and resources in order to be able to provide more services and service greater number of people. Jenny also believed that education programs for the community should be increased because people are often in denial and, thus, refuse to seek help.

I was impressed by what I learnt about Safe Harbor Crisis Nursery and Family Support Center as well as Jenny’s ideas. I believe that the center takes a pragmatic approach (Freeman, 2000) to ethics because it understands that ethics are not only important for moral reasons but to the success of the center’s goals. Jenny also believes that social services provider should go for practical wisdom so as to maximize the overall social welfare of the society rather than pursuing individual glory. This is why she believes the social services provider would be better able to achieve their goals by joining hands rather than competing with each other.

References

Freeman, S. (2000). Moral and Ethical Development. In Ethics: An Introduction to Philosophy and Practice. Wadsworth/Thomson.

Safe Harbor Crisis Nursery. (n.d.). About Us. Retrieved February 28, 2012, from http://www.crisis-nursery.org/index.php/about-us