Your Social Work E-News for July is here!
Social Work E-News 
Issue #224, July 9, 2019
 
 
 
Social Work E-News
 
Editor's Eye
Hello --
 
 
Welcome to Issue #224 of the Social Work E-News! Thank you for subscribing to receive this email newsletter, which is brought to you by the publisher of The New Social Worker magazine, SocialWorker.com, SocialWorkJobBank.com, and other social work publications.
 
The New Social Worker website is a great place to find a variety of new and archived articles on job search, social work careers, practice, ethics, technology, and more issues for new grads, as well as seasoned social work professionals.
 
 
Reminder: Our Spring/Summer issue is available NOW! Read articles from the Spring/Summer issue at http://www.socialworker.com.
Here’s a quick link for immediate download of the PDF edition for Spring/Summer 2019:
 
 
Highlights: gun violence dialogue and social work values, social work and autoimmune disease, your social work legacy, assessing for PTSD in terminally ill patients, loss and chronic illness, the technology monster, and more. See listing below (after the "Featured Excerpt").
 
Our next issue will be Fall 2019. In the meantime, we are publishing articles by our columnists and others over the summer on our website, so follow us on the social media platform of your choice to hear about these new articles! The first of our columnists' summer columns is on ethics consultation by Dr. Allan Barsky, published today!
 
 

 
 
Have you subscribed to our mailing lists? You can go to http://www.socialworker.com/Subscribe_to_The_New_Social_Worker and subscribe (free) to receive an email reminder and table of contents of each issue of The New Social Worker magazine when it is available. If you are a subscriber to the E-News (which you are reading now), this does NOT mean that you are automatically subscribed to The New Social Worker magazine. They are two different publications.
 
Are you one of our 177,000+ fans on Facebook? Connect with us—we love connecting with you!
 
 
Until next time,
Linda Grobman, ACSW, LSW
Publisher/Editor
THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER®
 
This Month

July marks several observances, including but not limited to:
  • Juvenile Arthritis Awareness Month
  • Minority Mental Health Awareness Month
  • International Day of Friendship (July 30)
  • World Day Against Trafficking in Persons (July 30)
and more.
 
Job Corner/Current Job Openings
 
Seeking FT Adoption Social Worker with Supervisory Experience for small Wynnewood Office of non-profit adoption agency. MSW Required. Min. 2 year adoption/child welfare experience. Day to day supervision of 2 social workers and 2 administrative staff. Working with and counseling pregnant women, and prospective adoptive parents: home studies, post placement visits and outreach. EOE
 
For details and job summary, visit www.afth.org/careers
Salary: $45,000-$50,000
Please Include Cover Letter.
 
 

 
 
Find jobs for new grads and experienced social work practitioners at http://www.socialworkjobbank.com, THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER’s online job board and career center.
 
 
If you or your agency are hiring social workers, don’t forget to post your jobs on SocialWorkJobBank.com. Please check the SocialWorkJobBank “products/pricing” page for job posting options and SPECIAL offers. 
 
Job seeker services are FREE—including searching current job openings, posting your confidential résumé/profile, and receiving email job alerts. Please let employers know that you saw their listings in the SOCIAL WORK E-NEWS and at SocialWorkJobBank.com.
 
 
 
Featured Excerpt

What About Us? The Mental Health of Social Workers
 
Editor’s Note: This excerpt is from THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER's Clinical Intersections blog, a collaboration with Walnut Psychotherapy Center in Philadelphia, PA.
 
This has been our most popular new article so far this year! Read the complete article at:
 
 
 
     I had a dream the other night about a client. It was a client I had only seen three times, probably two years ago or so. In the dream, she offered to act as the security guard for my newly widowed mother. She said it was to thank me for our work together.
 
     I am sure there are a lot of meanings that can be made of the dream, most of which I will probably think of with my therapist or forget about completely. But the obvious meaning that I draw from it, right off the bat, is that sometimes we want our clients to take care of us - not because we aren’t good at our jobs or because we have some pathological need, but, instead, because it’s hard to be in non-reciprocal relationships all day. Sometimes we get thanked and sometimes we don’t. Most times we don’t. And the need to be seen shows up somehow, in our waking life or sleep.
 
     This is all to say that it’s hard to be a social worker. And this fact makes it necessary to discuss our mental health openly with each other, with our loved ones, with our supervisors, and with our families; as a fact of our lives that we need to tend to carefully, diligently, and thoughtfully. 
 
     Mental health exists on a continuum. We all have it. Sometimes we lean more toward mental health struggles, and sometimes we lean more toward mental health stability. We never stay in one place permanently. It is ridiculous to think that some of us struggle with mental illness and some of us don’t. Our minds and psyches are all in this, and none of us are invulnerable to that reality.
 
     Here are some ways to pay close attention to where we are on the continuum at any given time.
 
1. Do daily body scans.
     The relationship between our minds and our bodies is correlated at an exactly 1:1 ratio. Sometimes information about how our mind is doing is stored in our body, and sometimes information about how our body is doing is stored in the mind. We have opportunities to discuss our minds in different settings, but the body is rarely invited into the conversation. It falls on us to bring it back. The other day, my watch gave me an alert that my heart rate was unusually high. It was during a particularly difficult conversation with a supervisee. But had my watch not alerted me to how my body was responding, I truly would not have known. We become so inoculated to our body’s signals because of the pressures of our work that sometimes we cease being able to clearly hear them. Tune in and take the data seriously.
 
2. All buildings have maximum occupancy. What's yours?

     I am certain that all clients maintain psychological real estate in our minds. Some amounts of square footage we are aware of; some are less obvious to us. I have clients who occupy so much of my thoughts at times that I wonder how I have time to think about the other things in my life that really matter to me. This is particularly true when the cases have high levels of acuity and I am second guessing a lot of the decisions that I am making. Please know that you, too, have a limited amount of psychological square footage, and it needs to be used economically in order for you to experience sustainability during your career. You can assess your own max levels by the sheer numbers of clients you have, but the formula is rarely this simple. In fact, the more diverse your caseload, the more space you often have. But if you are dealing with recurring themes, diagnoses, and behaviors, it is easy to short circuit. It is really important to take your own limits seriously and to figure out how to establish boundaries around them...which leads me to my next suggestion.
 
News and Resources
 
Minority Mental Health Awareness Month Resources
 
During National Minority Mental Health Awareness Month in July, the HHS Office of Minority Health (OMH) is launching a free and accredited e-learning program: Improving Cultural Competency for Behavioral Health Professionals. This new program is part of OMH’s Think Cultural Health E-learning Curricula, which are developed to help build knowledge and skills related to the National Standards for Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services in Health and Health Care (National CLAS Standards).
 
See the OMH Minority Mental Health website for more information about minority mental health and information on events taking place this month.
 
Also, in honor of Minority Mental Health Awareness Month, Mental Health America has translated into Spanish its 2019 Mental Health Month 4Mind4Body materials and provides additional information on mental health in Latinx/Hispanic communities.
 
 

 
 
“All people accused of crimes are considered innocent until proven guilty,” said NASW Social Justice and Human Rights Manager Mel Wilson. “However, one out of three people accused of crimes – or about 450,000 Americans – languish in jail before trial because they cannot afford bail.” 
 
According to the recently released NASW report, Abolishing Cash Bail to Promote Social Justice, bail costs have been rising. This has disproportionately harmed some populations, including people who are Black or Latino. 
 
The bail system also has insidious ripple effects. People who are incarcerated tend to experience poorer health and lose their jobs, housing, and custody of their children. 
People who are incarcerated are also more likely to accept plea bargains to get out of jail. People who can afford bail and are at home are less likely to plea bargain and more likely to go free. 
 
NASW recommends that the cash bail system and bail bondsman be eliminated. The ability for people who are accused of crimes to pay monetary sanctions should also be based on their income level or there should be a flat reduction in monetary sanctions.
 
“Ending the cash bail system would help our nation achieve more equity,” Wilson said. “When people fight their cases from the community, rather than jail, they can continue contributing to those communities and avoid the harms caused by incarceration."
 
 

 
 
How Can Social Workers Help Immigrant Children and Families Separated at the Border?
 
NASW has a new video about helping immigrant children and families with suggestions from NASW Texas Executive Director Miriam Nissenbaum. Please let us know of other resources and avenues you have found to help in this crisis.
 
 

 
Write for THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER
 
I am seeking a limited number of articles for THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER website and magazine. Is there an issue that you are passionate about that corresponds with an upcoming “awareness” month, week, or day; holiday; or time of year/season? This is a good way to identify a topic for a timely article for our website.
 
For the magazine, we are seeking articles on social work career development, field placement issues, and fields of practice.
 
Our style is conversational and educational, and web articles typically run 500-750 words. Feature articles typically run 1,250-1,500 words. We want positive articles that social workers can use to help them advance in their careers.
 
I also welcome submissions of poetry, photographs, illustrations, artwork, videos, audio, and other creative work depicting social work and related topics.
 
Please contact Linda Grobman, editor/publisher of THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER, at: lindagrobman@socialworker.com
 
Submit articles to Linda Grobman with a subject line that says “Submission—(insert title or topic of submission).” Attach your submission as a Word file. Please include in this file: title of submission, your name as you want it to appear with your article, body of your submission, a brief bio about yourself.  I will then review your submission and let you know if I need anything else and/or whether it is accepted for publication.
 
Please email Linda Grobman with ideas for longer (1,250-1,500 words) "feature articles" for THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER magazine.
 
For more detailed information, please read our complete Writers' Guidelines.
 
Thank you!
In Print
Days in the Lives of Social Workers: 62 Professionals Tell "Real-Life" Stories From Social Work Practice (5th Edition)
 
Spend a day with social workers in 62 different settings, and learn about the many career paths available to you. Did you ever wish you could tag along with a professional in your chosen field, just for a day? DAYS IN THE LIVES OF SOCIAL WORKERS allows you to take a firsthand, close-up look at the real-life days of 62 professional social workers as they share their stories. Join them on their journeys, and learn about the rewards and challenges they face.
 
"While the broadness of social work is what brings many people into the profession, at times it can be overwhelming. Fortunately, we have Linda May Grobman to help social workers navigate their careers through the eyes of those with real life experience. The 5th edition of Days in the Lives of Social Workers includes traditional and non-traditional career paths that offer a practical and realistic snapshot of the diverse fields of social work. An added bonus is the updated list of professional organizations, web resources, and social media, blogs and podcasts. This is a must have for social workers at any stage in their career!"
Jennifer Luna, MSSW
Director, Dinitto Career Center
The University of Texas at Austin, Steve Hicks School of Social Work
 
 

 
 
The A-to-Z Self-Care Handbook for Social Workers and Other Helping Professionals

The A-to-Z format in this book provides 26 practical strategies for your personal self-care plan. Learn how to make a SMART plan and keep yourself accountable. Easy to read and essential for any social worker or helping professional.
ISBN: 978-1-929109-53-1

 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
BEDTIME READING/GIFTS
 
 
BEGINNINGS, MIDDLES, & ENDS: SIDEWAYS STORIES ON THE ART & SOUL OF SOCIAL WORK
 
With just the right blend of humor and candor, each of these stories contains nuggets of wisdom that you will not find in a traditional textbook. They capture the essence and the art and soul of social work.
 
 
 

 
 
 
Now in Paperback and Hardcover: ON CLINICAL SOCIAL WORK: MEDITATIONS AND TRUTHS FROM THE FIELD is Dr. Danna Bodenheimer's NEWEST book.

The beautiful, full-color book - now in paperback and hardcover - makes a meaningful gift for you, a student, or a colleague. It is available  now at Amazon and Barnes and Noble (and other bookstores, too).

Jonathan Singer of the Social Work Podcast wrote the foreword to this book, and he said, "Danna pays attention to life’s details with a psychotherapist’s insight and writes about them with the passion of a slam poet. She speaks to the soul of social work and inspires us to think about more than just social work."
Jonathan B. Singer, Ph.D., LCSW, Associate Professor, Loyola University Chicago, Founder and host, Social Work Podcast

Now available in a black & white edition, too.
 
A perfect companion to Danna Bodenheimer's first book, Real World Clinical Social Work: Find Your Voice and Find Your Way.





   
White Hat Communications, publisher of THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER magazine and the Social Work E-News, has published several books about social work. These books make great gifts (for graduation, holidays, or other occasions) for yourself, or for your friends, students, and colleagues in social work!
 
We also publish books on nonprofit management. Want to start your own agency? We have a book for that.
 
 
HOW TO ORDER
 
Our books are available through our secure online store at:
 
Most of our publications are available at Amazon.com. (Some are available in Kindle format, as well as print.)
 
Many of our books are also available as ebooks at VitalSource.
 
 

 
Reminders
 
Network with us:
Quick Link: Spring/Summer 2019
  
VISIT OUR SITES

www.socialworker.com
 
 

IN THIS ISSUE
Editor's Eye
This Month
Job Corner/Current Job Openings
Featured Excerpt
News & Resources
In Print
Reminders
NEWSLETTER NECESSITIES
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