Hi all, I'm Ben (he/him), a full-time student heading into my second year of the program on a clinical track. I'm switching into social work from teaching public high school in Philadelphia and eventually I'd like to continue working with young people with more of a focus towards mental health and general wellbeing. My field placement this coming year will be with the Community Outreach Program at the Drexel Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice, which will involve me doing early intervention group work for young adults directly or indirectly affected by violence. I'm excited for how directly this course overlaps with the core of what I'll be doing this year and intend to do as a social worker into the future.
Last year I was placed at Maria de los Santos Health Center interning as a behavioral health consultant. I primarily worked with adults but eventually we lost our pediatric specialist and the pediatric cases were spread among the rest of us. I've had more experience with older adolescents professionally and felt uncomfortable and clunky adapting what I had learned about the integrative health model to work with younger children, or children and parents simultaneously, which is something I look forward to improving through this class.