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Personnel Training Modules Support Youth Transition to Adulthood

All youth make decisions and choices at times that are so irresponsible they make adults cringe. Youth with emotional or behavioral difficulties (EBD) as a whole are even less capable than their non-disabled peers to understand the link between their behavior and choices and the associated impact on self and others.

Research shows that these youth and young adults with EBD have the highest rate of dropout from secondary school among all disability groups, and that they, in general, experience the poorest outcomes in employment, postsecondary education, independent living, and incarceration of any of the disability groups.

To promote better outcomes, researchers from the University of South Florida are piloting personnel training modules that will enable professionals and caretakers to assist youth in making the connection between their behavior and what happens to them. In this program, young people with EBD learn to successfully solve problems and make decisions by identifying their options and understanding the advantages and disadvantages of each. As they solve problems more independently and productively, outcomes are likely to be more positive, resulting in an improved quality of life for them and those around them.

The training series, Training Modules for Personnel Serving Transition-Aged Youth and Young Adults, is being pilot tested as an on-line module and is also available as a competency-based personnel training workshop through faculty and staff from the Transition to Independence Program Team at the National Center on Youth Transition (NCYT), housed within the Department of Child and Family Studies at USF’s Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health (FMHI). The series is designed for teachers, mental health specialists, transition facilitators, employment specialists, guidance counselors, resource coordinators, parents, foster parents, vocational rehabilitation counselors, and juvenile justice personnel.

“If young people are to make a successful transition into adulthood, they must be able to communicate competently and work cooperatively with others,” said Hewitt “Rusty” Clark, author of the modules, and a leading expert in the area of transitioning youth. Additional authors include Karen Blase, who along with Clark is a USF/FMHI faculty member, and Robin Wagner, a Board Certified Behavior Analyst at FMHI.

Clark says that people who come into contact with the youth exhibiting challenging behavior need to not only identify the challenges and deficits, but also need to focus on the strengths and resources of the youth. “This allows the youth and others to focus on the possibilities rather than the problems,” added Clark, “the options rather than the constraints.” And at that point, says Clark, achievements can occur.

Although these modules are a self-directed skill building approach, they are set within the context of the Transition to Independence Process (TIP) model, which provides a conceptual framework and specific principles that should guide one’s work with youth and young adults with EBD. The TIP system was developed to engage youth and young adults in planning for their own futures, provide them with developmentally-appropriate services and supports, and involve them and their families and other informal key players in a process that prepares and facilitates them in their movement toward greater self-sufficiency as adults.

The Training Modules are:

For sites that want to ensure that personnel are provided adequate practice and feedback to ensure competency-based training on the Problem-Solving and Decision-Making Processes modules, the TIP Team at NCYT can provide on-site workshops. The goal of the TIP Team is to build the capacity at a site to meet and maintain effective practices for working with youth and young adults during this transition period.

“Given the needs of transition-aged youth and young adults with EBD, it’s important that Transition Facilitators, and others working with and on behalf of these young people, have the skills and tools to help youth as they transition to adulthood,” added Clark. “We hope the training modules and workshops can help provide those necessary competencies.”

Each of the modules can be downloaded at http://tip.fmhi.usf.edu/training_modules.htm

For additional information about the TIP model or the NCYT, please visit websites (http://tip.fmhi.usf.edu and http://ncyt.fmhi.usf.edu) or contact Jordan Knab, Nicole Deschenes, or Rusty Clark.

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