Hi!  I'm Beth, a senior psychology major.  


This past summer (2006) I worked/completed my **Child, Family, and Community Practicum** at **Montgomery Transitional Services, Inc. Children & Youth Program (C&Y)** as a Residence Counselor for my second summer in a row.  C&Y is a residential program for emotionally disturbed and mentally ill youth ages 12-18.  As this is my second summer with MTS, I have been given more responsibility and duties and as a result have acquired much more experience and knowledge.  

The house is located in Amsterdam, NY, which is only about 15 minutes away from my home.  C&Y has the capacity to house 8 residents and 1 youth on crisis (temporary-maximum stay of 2 weeks).  The house has two floors; the main floor contains a living room, kitchen, dining room, laundry room, living room, bathroom, 2 male bedrooms (1-single, 1-double), and the office, while the upstairs contains 4 female bedrooms (2-singles, 2-doubles), a bathroom, and a TV lounge.  There is also a basement which contains a food storage room, a TV/game room, and a weight room.  

Currently C&Y has four female residents and three male residents.  Their diagnoses range from severe depression to ADHD to schizophrenia, with many of the residents additionally being classified as Bipolar.   Many of the residents are adopted or come from broken homes, in which the parents/legal guardians no longer want to/feel they can adequately provide the necessary care or supervision.  In addition, I have noticed that most of our residents have at one point in their lives been sexually abused.  On average, the youth remain at C&Y for approximately 1 year, but some stay for only a few months, while others have been at C&Y for years and eventually age out and enter into other MTS programs designed for adults.

C&Y runs on a point/level system, in which the residents are required to reach different point levels in order to obtain certain privileges, such as going downstairs to play Playstation or to go on off-premise recreations (ie. movies, bowling, summer concerts).  The residents earn points for simple activities such as making beds, keeping rooms clean, and completing their chores.  They also earn points for completing their Goal Oriented Tasks (GOTs) which are individual tasks that are included in their Service Plans.  All the residents are enrolled in BOCES programs at area schools and are required to attend.

As a Residence Counselor my responsibilities include a variety of tasks ranging from taking residents on appointments, to writing Progress Notes in their files, to simply interacting with them at the house.  Frequently, I transport the clients to their therapy sessions at the St. Mary’s Children’s Clinic, and often times I am invited to sit in on the sessions.  I have also taken several of the clients to their psychiatrist appointments with Dr. Marballi, a child psychiatrist at the Children’s Clinic, and have been asked my opinion on clients’ behaviors and effectiveness of medication.  

I have also been on shift on several different occasions in which our residents have required emergency transportation for a psychological evaluation at the emergency room (which is often times followed by temporary hospitalization at a psychiatric hospital).  One female resident, in particular, is excessively violent towards staff as well as her peers and I have had to assist with restraints on multiple occasions.  Suicide attempts are also relatively common, mostly by the female residents.  Another female resident was consistently attempting to jump off of the fire escape on the side of the house for 2 weeks straight!  While yet another female resident regressed to her old habits and began cutting her wrists again.

Although I have encountered several horrible situations while at C&Y, they have undoubtedly provided and exposed me to experiences and knowledge that you cannot learn from classes or textbooks.  I have gained so much practical experience from being at the house and around the kids.  I have definitely learned so much and know that I will take these experiences with me throughout my life.
   
Being at C&Y has also made me realize that I want to go to graduate school for Educational Psychology and focus my research interests on at-risk youth, particularly those suffering from emotional and mental disorders.  My experiences being at a residential home has opened my eyes to several of the downfalls of residential programs.  It was devastating to see the lack of support that many of the youth received from their families.  Even worse was when I worked the day shift this past Christmas and only two of the residents had families willing to take them for a home visit.  Exposure to residential program “success” stories that involve residents being reunited with their families for an entire month before re-hospitalization, or with families who shoot bottle-rockets at each other for fun, has shown me the necessity for continuing research, in order to bring about changes.  Emerging from these experiences is my interest in investigating the influence of family involvement on adolescents residing in group homes and treatment facilities.  In particular, I would eventually like to explore and compare the proportion of adopted to non-adopted youth in residential treatment programs.


PracticumExperiences