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Narrative Therapy Dissertation
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Chapter 1 and 2 |
Finding Common Ground Between Human Service Seekers, Providers, A Reauthoring Conversations Approach |
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A Dissertation by Maragaret Fierst Sax |
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Finding Common Ground Between Human Service Seekers, Providers,and Planners: A Reauthoring Conversations Approach
by Margaret Fierst Sax Dear readers, My PhD thesis applied a reauthoring conversations approach within a participatory action research design to explore "common ground experiences" between parents of children with special needs, family therapists, early childhood care and education providers and state & federal human service planners.The research project began with a parent's provocative statement: How can people check their power at the door and just bring their knowledge." From different perspectives, participants described common ground experiences as relationships that express friendship skills and contradict established practices of professional distancing. The study took place in Vermont, USA. In my literature review, I cross pollinated three social emancipatory movements: narrative ideas and practices, reinventing human services, and participative inquiry as a research methodology. On this site, you will find the abstract, the table of contents, and the first two chapters. Please contact me directly at peggys@middlebury.edu if you are earnestly interested in hearing more. Thank you for the opportunity to share my work.
Peggy Sax
"How can people check their power at the door and just bring their knowledge into meetings?"
Julie, the mother of a child with special needs, spoke these provocative words in March 1998, as part of a workshop in Burlington, Vermont that explored the applications of narrative therapy with work in the public sector. A small group of human service providers and parents of children with special needs were interviewed by Michael White, a visiting family therapist. The interview focused on participants' experiences in working together as a community-planning group, within a Vermont statewide initiative called Children's Upstream Services (CUPS). Julie's words struck a chord that resonated throughout a room of 250 people, as an invitation to collectively grapple with the issue of power relations between human service seekers, providers, and planners. The audience included a diverse group of human service professionals from community mental health, public health, early childhood care and education, social welfare, and other nonprofit organizations. Consumers of such services were also present. This event engaged my curiosity and inaugurated the participatory action research project upon which this dissertation is based.
Research Question This research project applied the ideas and practices of narrative therapy to investigate common ground experiences between human service seekers, providers, and planners. I chose to focus on parents of children with special needs and the people from whom they seek help. My hope was that a narrative approach, otherwise known as "re-authoring conversations," could contribute to the skills and knowledge that inform meaningful family involvement in human services and effective help-giving relationships. I wanted to know what helps family members to speak up, to feel supported, and to become meaningfully involved in the planning, delivery, and evaluation of human services. I also wanted to better understand the shifts for professionals in attitude and practice required to become accountable to those they serve and to build effective help-giving relationships based on parent-professional partnerships. The practical knowledge generated by this research project also contributes to a theoretical understanding of the social construction of parent-professional relationships. Participants in this research project shared experiential knowledge that demands a critical look at the assumptions underlying the designated roles within the help-giving relationship and in the involvement of family members in planning and implementation of human services. Service seekers are demanding significant changes from the traditional relationship between "the healed and the healer," which has elevated professional knowledge over experiential knowledge. This dissertation examines the cultural and professional discourses that inform power relations in human services and the underlying rules of engagement. In particular, I focus on accountability, and the need for a different model to contribute to more equitable relationships in which those in professional roles hold themselves accountable to those who seek their services, and take responsibility to amplify the voices less likely to be heard. The research interviews explored what the seekers, providers, and planners of human services have learned through experience and how these skills and knowledge shape new developments in creating effective help-giving relationships. From the perspective of different roles, people told their stories and consulted with each other. Participants identified preferred developments, externalized the constraints that can interfere, and deconstructed implicit cultural and professional discourses. As research facilitator, I tried to create safe conversational contexts in which salient themes would emerge. In the dissertation, I have woven together the voices of participants with my own analysis and situated these findings within the current literature. The active questioning of a narrative approach is best conveyed in the exchange that inaugurated this research project. Appendix A includes a transcribed video edit in which Michael White engages the interviewees in an exploration of their contributions to changes in power relations and reflects upon the possibilities for the future. He created a context in which Julie and the other interviewees felt comfortable to speak at a professional conference and to be witnessed in front of hundreds of people. Julie described her belief that "knowledge is power" and her personal goal to learn all that she can so that she can feel adequate when she goes into a meeting full of professionals: "I want to feel like I have the knowledge like they do, and I can participate on sort of the same level." She also spoke about the emotional challenges faced by the service seeker in gaining self-confidence, and trusting that service providers can be of help when they do not have personal experience parenting a child with special needs. "When you go into that meeting, I can't help thinking that if they don't have a child who has special needs who can use the services, then they won't know where I am coming from." Carol, another parent on this panel, acknowledged with delight the strength she has witnessed in Julie over time: " She is not afraid to say what she feels, whereas she may have been three years ago." As the mother of older children, Carol reflected on the process that parents go through in learning to speak out for their children and themselves: "For myself, being older, and having more experience, I tend to have accountability." She has learned skills and self-confidence to speak up when someone attempts to take over or dominate. My participation in this interview helped form the research focus on power relations. While I believed wholeheartedly in accountability, I wanted to better understand its relevance to parents' participation in meetings and to the help-giving relationship. White's re-authoring conversations approach provided conceptual guidance and specific tools to inquire into questions such as the following. What helps and hinders the process through which parents of children with special needs speak out and are heard? What are the underlying cultural and professional discourses that inform parent-professional relationships? How can professional helpers become more conscious of acts of power that occur despite good intention? What are the real effects when skills, knowledge, and new developments are witnessed and acknowledged? The narrative re-authoring approach provided an opportunity to better understand the power relations between service providers and seekers and to support and strengthen effective help-giving relationships. Thus, I explore two aspects of family-professional relationships: meaningful parent involvement and effective help-giving. 1. Meaningful parent involvement: A growing number of professionals share a commitment to family-centered, community-based, culturally sensitive principles and work hard to create individualized, inclusive, and user- friendly services, collaborative systems of care, and responsive policy development. While parents are, at times, included in these planning conversations, their involvement is far from where it needs to be. My hope is that this research can contribute to the research base for the meaningful inclusion of family members in human service planning, delivery, training, evaluation, and policy development. 2. Effective help-giving: The literature on family-centered practices views professional services within an array of family resources that strengthen natural support networks and build family and community life. Practitioners need to develop what Dunst and Trivette called "participatory practices" to actively support and strengthen family members in their decision-making, self-determination, skill development, and self-confidence (Dunst, Trivette et al., 1994). In particular, my research sought to add to the body of knowledge that operationalizes participatory practices into daily practice and provides conceptual tools for a continual process of self-reflection.
Relevance of Research As a practitioner, I have moved between the professional worlds of early intervention, family therapy, children's mental health, and organization development. I am drawn to parallels where professional services seek to become less professionally centered, more linked with the family support movement, and more strengthening of community-based resources. I have had an abiding interest in power relations between those who seek help and those who provide it: parents and professionals, clients and therapists. This has motivated me to explore ways in which parent-professional relationships can move beyond the traditional medical and mental health models that were defined by clinical distance and hierarchical organization, with the professional in the position of expert. Throughout, I have kept coming back to different versions of the same question: How can service planners and providers join families without taking over? How can professionals support the autonomy and active involvement of people who seek their services? How can we create safe contexts in which we can learn from each other? What can narrative ideas and practices contribute to these questions? Participants in this action research grappled with these questions. This dissertation amplifies their voices, filtered through my interpretative lens. Whether called family-professional partnerships, collaborative family-centered care, or family support, the relationships between people on both sides of human service delivery are the focus of much discussion. Excellent materials seek to strengthen family-professional partnerships, family support, family self-determination, and community-based systems of care (Turnbull & Turnbull, 1990; Dechillo, Koren et al., 1994; Adams, Biss et al., 1998; Roberts, Rule et al., 1998). For decades, the family support movement has been advocating for family support and meaningful parent involvement (Bryant-Comstock, Huff et al., 1996). Guiding principles and best practice have been identified (Family Resource Coalition, 1996). Many family members have spoken out and eloquently written about what helps and what hinders their working relationships with professionals (Turnbull & Turnbull, 1978; Featherstone, 1980; Turnbull & Turnbull, 1985). Carl Dunst, Carol Trivette, and their colleagues have written extensively on characteristics of effective help-seeking practices (Dunst, Trivette et al., 1994a; 1994b), social support networks (Dunst, Trivette et al., 1988), and the conceptual and empirical foundations of community-based family support programs (Dunst, 1994; 1997; Dunst, Trivette et al., 1990, 1988a, 1988b. Within the field of children's mental health, the role of family members in systems of care has changed dramatically since 1984 when the United States Congress passed the Child and Adolescent Service System Program (CASSP) (Stroul & Friedman, 1986; Friedman, Duchnowski et al.,1989; Stroul, Lourie et al., 1992; Stroul, 1996). These reform efforts compelled states to improve services for children with serious emotional, behavioral, or mental disorders, with full family participation. I have been a witness to the evolution of the definition of meaningful family involvement and the changing role of parents in evaluation and service planning. Family members not only advocate for services needed by their own children, but they trained to provide ally-to-ally family support services through family organizations. While these grassroots changes are spreading throughout Vermont, systems and attitudes are slow to change. My hope is that this research can contribute to these efforts. As a student of organizational studies, I was immediately drawn to literature on organizational learning (Argyris & Schon, 1978; 1996), participative inquiry (Reason, 1988; 1994; Reason & Rowan, 1994; Heron, 1996) and the reflective practitioner (Schon, 1983; 1985). The field of organizational learning provides useful constructs to guide human services through a process of continually learning from past experiences, both successes and failures. This meant asking lots of questions: What makes organizations conducive to learning? What kinds of learning are most desirable? How can we put more of an accent on learning as a trial-and-error, ongoing process? How can human service delivery systems move toward practicing what is preached? In particular, I was intrigued with unpacking the traditional rules of engagement in the help-seeking relationship that make professionals primarily accountable to peers instead of to those who seek their services. When I discovered Schon's idea of "a reflective contract," I was struck by similarities with Dunst's "participatory practices," both of which orient practitioners to become more directly accountable to the client and require new competencies. These shifts in attitude and practices are also the bedrock for "partnership accountability," which was first developed by K. Tamasese, Charles Waldergrave, and their colleagues at the Family Centre in Lower Hutt, New Zealand, as part of "The Just Therapy" approach (Tamasese & Waldergrave, 1993). Partnership accountability asks those with more power to take responsibility to amplify the voices less likely to be heard and to hold themselves accountable to the people most affected by their actions. As an organizing concept for this dissertation, partnership accountability offered a different approach to address power relations between human service seekers, providers, and planners, and one that is in alignment with the reflective contract. In my studies, I gravitated to writings on research and reflexivity that highlighted the importance of making explicit the iterative process of self-questioning through which assumptions and choices are continuously reflected upon (Steier, 1990; 1995). Reflecting teamwork is a narrative practice used in this research project, which highlights reflexivity. Emerging ideas and collaborative practices associated with the reflecting team have impacted the field of family therapy for more than a decade (Andersen, 1987; Anderson & Goolishian, 1988; Miller & Lax,1988; Lussardi & Miller, 1990; Friedman, 1995). Applications of reflecting teamwork in community and organizational contexts are beginning to appear in the literature (Simons, 1998; Conference Collective, 1999). This research project contributes to efforts by family therapists to offer their skills beyond the therapy room and explores the application of reflecting teamwork as a method for research reflexivity. This project rests on the shoulders of these endeavors. It explored ways a narrative approach to participatory intervention could contribute to the existing knowledge on parent-professional partnership. I have applied narrative ideas and practices to a participatory action research design to honor the voices of experience and to create contexts in which people could consult with each other about what they have learned along the way. I sought to inquire into new developments and into how these learnings about common ground experiences could be brought into the joint planning of future projects and effective help-giving relationships.
A Narrative Lens Narrative ideas and practices and the work of Michael White and David Epston have transformed my work as a family therapist. I have been privileged to witness countless therapeutic experiences in which a re-authoring conversations framework has made a significant difference in people's lives. For a number of years, I have been experimenting with applications outside of the therapy room to facilitate community and organizational change. My familiarity with narrative therapy made it possible to readily draw from particular concepts and practices and to apply these to the research context. The research conceptual framework, interviewing practices, design, methodology, and data analysis were seen through a narrative lens that focuses on the meaning people give to experiences and how these stories structure lives. Re-authoring conversations also offered deconstructive practices to unpack the power relations between the help-giver and the help-seeker and to look at real effects on people's lives and relationships. A particular narrative protocol or "relative questioning micro-map" was used to invite participants to articulate how they make meaning out of a given experience, the real effects, and how they evaluate the positive and negative effects (White, 1997). Reflecting teamwork helped participants in this research project to engage in multiple, reflexive levels of reflection and inquiry as outsider witness to each other's emergent ideas. Participants were given multiple opportunities to reflect together upon their experiences of finding common ground and to build upon their reciprocal discoveries. Participants were encouraged to speak from their own experiences while ensuring that their comments specifically relate back to the interview. The narrative approach offered additional opportunities for research reflexivity through "taking it back" interviewing practices that acknowledge the two-way nature of conversation (White, 1997). As I moved between interviews, I brought videotape and stories with me from prior interviews. Many times, participants described ways other participants' stories contributed to their thinking, awareness of possibilities, and specific actions. When I brought back to communities and individuals stories of ways in which their words have impacted on others, participants were noticeably touched to know that their words made a difference to others. The research conversations also had a powerful impact on my own thinking and relationships, since I was privy to all 20 interviews.
Research Context This research study drew from one aspect of a very ambitious, complex, and broad-based, early childhood, mental health initiative in Vermont, The Children's Upstream Services (CUPS) Initiative. The CUPS project began in October 1997, when the Vermont Department of Developmental and Mental Health Services received a five year federal grant through the Center for Mental Health Services (CMHS) to strengthen community-based systems of care for families and children. Funded through the Center for Mental Health Services (CMHS), CUPS is part of a national initiative to develop and enhance community-based services for children and adolescents in 22 sites across the United States. The CUPS initiative provides a wealth of opportunities for data collection from the perspectives of service seekers, providers, and planners. CUPS faces the challenge of meeting community needs for a wide range of resources and services for families with young children within the parameters of the federal grant for families living with severe emotional disturbance. As an early childhood initiative, CUPS must address a spectrum of needs and mental health strategies ranging from prevention to high-risk intervention. Early childhood care and education programs carry a strong commitment to preventive care available as support to all families and young children in communities. This means folding the system of care into the existing Vermont early childhood network in contexts such as childcare settings, primary health care, and community resources. The children's mental health system of care seeks to create community-based services and state initiatives for children with serious emotional disturbance. These different priorities can pose tensions between state administrators, families, and service providers as expressed in regional and statewide meetings. The research conversations focused on the community planning associated with CUPS. This process enlisted family members and professionals to co-design local systems of care that strengthen and support families with young children. During the first year of the CUPS grant, each of the12 regions in Vermont participated in an intensive planning process to develop a unique design. This included a regional vision, an inventory of existing resources and gaps in-services, priorities, proposed services within a system of care, outcomes and indicators, creative financing, blended funding, management structure, and local needs for training and technical assistance. Participants in regional planning processes were from a wide range of backgrounds including parents, and professionals from child care services, parent/child centers, early childhood education, early intervention, mental health, social services, pediatrics and public health, education, substance abuse prevention, and community partnerships. All shared a passion for strengthening community resources for children and families. Rich histories include long-standing conflicts, alliances, and new beginnings. Many early childhood service providers had been working together in different capacities for many years and share a deep commitment to principles of family support and in strengthening community-based resources. Service providers from the mental health field tended to come from a different perspective and were most concerned with establishing effective interventions for children and families who are already experiencing emotional difficulties. This context demanded a kind of cross-cultural exchange among professionals from diverse background, and between human service providers, seekers, and planners toward a shared vision, common purpose, and action plan. While the community of providers struggled to find ways to encourage parent participation, parents often felt like when they spoke, their ideas were not sufficiently valued. These differences in perspective provided fertile ground for collaboration between diverse groups and individuals. As facilitator of the CUPS planning process in 7 of the 12 regions in Vermont, I became increasingly aware of the challenges faced by service seekers, providers, and planners in their attempts to develop effective working relationships and systems of care that foster earnest dialogue and effective action. I was especially intrigued by the contrast between the vision and realities of meaningful parent involvement. Despite good intentions, the CUPS community planning process typically elevated the voices of planners, and providers, and minimized input from service seekers. This piqued my curiosity about exceptions when parents and professionals move beyond traditional roles to mutually engage in honest conversation that leads to effective joint action. I began to wonder how the ideas and practices of narrative therapy might help shed light on these phenomena.
Research Design As participative inquiry, the action-oriented research design was informed by both participatory action research (PAR) and cooperative inquiry (Reason, 1994; Heron, 1996). Action steps and reflection were both aspects of this research project. In participatory action research, co-researchers make explicit and bring their knowledge into social action. Cooperative inquiry engages participants in an action-reflection process to generate a deeper awareness of experiences and actions. I chose a PAR design to accent the steps toward social action taken by research participants. However, the ripple effects from research conversations also raised the consciousness of many participants, which manifested in self-reflection and personal steps taken by individual participants. The "re-authoring conversations" narrative approach fit well with action-oriented research as it explores the stories that constitute people's lives in terms of both action and consciousness (White & Epston, 1990; White, 1991; 1995). This is based on Bruner's concept of "dual landscapes" in which (1) events are sequenced through time and (2) people realign with their preferences, beliefs and values, intentions and commitments. The interplay between action and meaning invites an intentional shaping of preferred new developments to facilitate real effects on people's lives and relationships, as well as the reflective space to step back, and query into the meaning that informs particular actions. Initially, I used as a starter dough for conversation a 10- minute video edit from the aforementioned interview conducted by Michael White, in March 1998, with parents and professionals from a CUPS regional planning team (a portion of which is offered as Appendix A). I was given permission to use this interview segment as an entry into the research conversations. While I had planned to use the same video edit to begin all of the interviews, I remembered the freedom offered by an action research design to develop an iterative process that builds upon accumulative wisdom. Thus, as the project unfolded, I compiled edited video selections to bring to communities. It was challenging to decide which video to show in which setting, especially since there were so many powerfully moving selections from which to choose. When an issue or question emerged, I was able to bring this inquiry into subsequent interviews. This reiterative process "thickened" certain themes that became more richly described over time. While I began this project with some interviewees in mind, others emerged as the project evolved. For example, the first several interviews were primarily between service seekers and providers. I did not want to lose the voices of service planners, so I then made arrangements to speak with state planners about their experiences. I also wanted to capture some of the aftermath reflections of participants; several times, I was able to interview people about their afterthoughts. Sometimes an issue arose during an interview that consumed my thoughts for days afterward; I not only brought this question into subsequent interviews, but I was actually able to arrange specific interviews with people I thought could help shed light on the emergent issue. The study took place over 16 months, from March 1998-July 1999. My intent was to enlist as co-researchers a diverse group of human service seekers, providers, and planners. I consulted with people who are actively engaged in community-based human services with a deep commitment to children and families. I also consulted throughout with colleagues who share an intrigue with narrative ideas and practices. Thus, the project involved many reiterations with reflexive pauses to step back, reflect, and further inquire. I met some participants for the first time when they came to a scheduled meeting out of curiosity for the research topic. As the project progressed, I requested interviews with specific persons to consult about emergent issues. Twenty interviews with more than 75 people were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed. Sources were: n Five Regional CUPS meetings (data set #2,3,4,5,9): I interviewed two regional groups twice after 4-7 month intervals, and another regional group was interviewed once near the end of the study. These were mixed groups with conversation between seekers, providers, and planners. I wanted to speak with people in local communities who are grappling with this issue on a daily basis. I was already familiar with these regional planning groups, having facilitated parts of their planning process. I chose these three groups out of a deep respect for their capacity for creative, collaborative thinking and the spirit of inquiry that guides their work. I think of them as pioneers in developing community-based, family-centered systems of care for families with young children. My hope was that this would provide a safe enough context for people to speak out about their experiences and to be heard by each other. n Two narrative therapy gatherings with Michael White (data set #1,5). Both utilized a four-part narrative interview with outsider witness practices. One was the large conference gathering in which Michael interviewed three parents, two providers from a CUPS regional planning group, and myself in the role of consultant to this group. Providers were intentionally in the minority in this interview. The other was a small gathering focused on this research study. Judy Davidson, an experienced narrative therapist colleague, interviewed three mothers and me about our experiences with the research project; Michael was interviewed about his reflections, and then a group of 15 colleagues added their inquiry and reflections as outsider witnesses. I purposefully asked Michael to be an interviewee at this gathering so we could play with our usual power relations. n Six inquiries into the subsequent ripple effects for participants from the evening gathering with Michael White that focused on this research study (data set # 6,7,8,11,12,18). I wanted to enlist the best thinking of my narratively oriented colleagues. These conversations attempted to deconstruct the cultures of human services and psychotherapy, power relations between providers and seekers, and the rules that inform professional boundaries. I was especially interested in exploring issues of accountability for providers who seek common ground experiences. These conversations helped me think clearly about the ethics of collaborative practice and of this research study. n Two gatherings of representatives from family support organizations committed to strengthening community resources with families as allies (data set # 13,19). These interviews inquired into changes needed for systems to truly listen to families and to support and strengthen parents' self-determination. I especially wanted input concerning pre-service and in-service training implications for professionals. As the project progressed, I felt a pressing need to consult with these passionately committed parent-professionals about how they manage frustrations with a system that moves too slowly and often in ways that are incongruent with espoused beliefs in family-centered practices. n Three interviews with local, state, and federal planners in human services (data set # 10,15,17). One informal gathering took place in interaction with a parent on the evening of a retreat for an early childhood "think-tank." Another was with the deputy secretary for the Vermont Agency of Human Services, a woman who is the former co-director of a parent/child center and deeply committed to strengthening community-based, family-centered services for children and families in Vermont. Another conversation was with the director of the Children and Family Unit of the Vermont Department of Developmental and Mental Health who is the principal investigator for the CUPS project. These conversations focused on unique challenges in the role of the planner and the Vermont context for human services. n One gathering of "The Venerable Mothers," a group of narrative therapists who are also mothers, and especially committed to the concept that "the professional is the personal" (data set #20). I consulted with them about the links between this project and feminist perspectives on woman and power and women in connection. A pediatrician who teaches pediatric residents (and happens to be married to "a venerable mother") also participated. n One interview with a German-American woman about cultural differences in relationships between providers and seekers of services. I was intrigued with unpacking her experience growing up in a small German village surrounded by extended family, and how this might inform perceived differences in relations with professionals. This last interview punctuated the end of the data collection. Ironically, it also opened up a whole new topic in looking at contextual implications that this project took place in the United States of America at the turn of the 21st century. While more questions were raised than answered, this interview helped situate the research in its social-historic context within "a never ending story." Ten of the research conversations were guided by White's four-part format for a narrative interview (White, 1995). I chose to use a reflecting team format in the larger gatherings when there were more than five people present. Several steps guided these interviews. 1. After viewing a video edit, I interviewed a local group of parents and providers about their ideas that were sparked by seeing this video. 2. The rest of the group who had witnessed the video and the interview formed a reflecting team with the opportunity to share their thoughts and questions in the presence of the small group of interviewees. 3. The small group was again interviewed about which ideas stood out to them. 4. The entire group engaged in a discussion of what this all means and identified next steps. The smaller research conversations also began with viewing a video edit, yet the interview format was more standard and without outsider witnesses. The 10 gatherings that followed the format of a four-part narrative interview were all videotaped. The other conversations were audiotaped. I transcribed and analyzed all materials, including my reflective notes and letters written to interviewees. Although 20 sources were recorded, many more conversations took place. As the project progressed, I consulted with colleagues and friends about emergent issues. Over the 16 months, I lived the question: How can human service seekers, providers, and planners get beyond "us and them" positioning to find common ground experiences? Each interview was illuminating and impactful. Throughout, I was moved by the stories that I heard. Often, I would bring their words into subsequent conversations. I felt like a conduit of sorts or a "broker" in the business of exchanging stories. Each reiteration built upon previous dialogue. The specifics were not planned, but occurred as the project emerged with a spirit of adventure and experimentation. Subsequent chapters chronicle these experiences, unanticipated effects on myself and other co-researchers. Still, there are not adequate means for measuring these ripple effects or the impact on people's lives. My hope is that these experiences will contribute to spreading the word within an oral tradition that has been around for a long time but which somehow has become challenged in the time squeeze of postmodern North American life.
Language Throughout, the narrative lens oriented my interpretive choices. I faced the challenge of speaking without narrative jargon to an interdisciplinary audience that included service seekers. In the dissertation, I have deliberately chosen to accent local knowledge and to minimize academic jargon. It is my belief that scholarly work can use understandable, experience-near terms to convey complex phenomena. My hope was to find inclusive, user-friendly language that resonated with all participants that could contribute to future advocacy on the behalf of children and families. At times, I felt torn between my commitment to participants and to the scholarly research. I thought a lot about the academic audience for this dissertation and the contribution I would like to make to the professional literature. I reflected on my frustration with academic writing, especially when disembodied knowledge is elevated over experience. A narrative approach is intentional in the use of language. Often, words and phrases are unpacked with a playful spirit of inquiry. The role of the facilitator&emdash;as therapist or action researcher&emdash;is to negotiate a mutually acceptable definition of the problem and unique possibilities, otherwise known as "unique outcomes ." Experience-near language is privileged over expert definitions. The shift from expert to popular definitions encourages people to become full participants in the re-authoring process. Both general and specific illustrations are highlighted with an emphasis on personal accounts. The process engages people's sense of agency to co-construct alternative definitions. This emergent and reiterative process is aided by narrative interviewing practices, and in particular, relative influence questioning, further described in the chapter on narrative practices. Originally, in my proposal, I used the term "role transcendence" to speak about getting beyond us and them between service seekers, service providers and service planners (Sax, 1999). In Webster's dictionary (Webster, 1979), transcend is defined as "to go beyond the limits of." Transcendence can have an additional connotation in philosophy and theology, "to be separate from or beyond." I liked this term, since it conveyed the need to extend beyond the limits of the usual roles. My committee members seemed intrigued by this term. However, "role transcendence" did not capture the imagination of many participants in the research study. It did not take long to realize I needed to find language that better matched their experiences and that did not sound like jargon. I appreciated the straightforward feedback and questioning that took place. Georgia, an early childhood care and education provider, was confused as to whether "transcendence" referred to switching roles: "I am remembering how when I go to meetings for my child, I feel like I need to prove myself, and pull out my vocabulary words. Is that what you mean by role transcendence?" As a service seeker, Meg had trouble remembering or connecting with "that transcendental relationship or whatever it was you called it." She had no idea what the term meant. "I probably couldn't even pronounce it." Jan, an early childhood care and education provider, did not think that it was accurate to speak of letting go of roles. When she reflected on all the things she has done over the years, she realized that " No matter what, I always come in with that teacher or educator hat." She might sit down and have a cup of coffee with a particular mother and at some level connect with her outside of her teacher role, saying, "I'm here to support you. I'm not here to judge you or criticize you. I am here to offer some support." But Jan questioned whether we actually ever truly transcend roles. While there are times where the hat comes off for a while, she does not leave it outside. I invited people to help me find the language that best fits their experiences. Participants joined in with the spirit of inquiry in asking about the best language to use. They identified key words and phrases like "connection," "getting beyond us versus them," "level playing field," and "partnership." They wanted something more straight-forward and positive sounding than "role transcendence." Prudence gave me the clearest message about role transcendence: "Chock it! It doesn't mean diddly squat. It's like 10 years ago, when people would say the word 'empowerment.' I didn't know what empowerment was. People were saying, 'We're giving you empowerment!' But it meant nothing. It's like trying to describe chocolate cake to someone who has never tasted chocolate cake before. Role transcendence is jargon and doesn't mean anything. How do I come to the table? How do we get stuff out in the open? How can I see you as a person rather than just as being from the Department of Education?" I ultimately chose "seeking common ground" as the best match for local experiences. Christie first proposed the term "common ground": "It could be that this experience had to do with providing services or that you are seeking services, but we all share in the planning and the development. So it is a shared dialogue of common ground. When we are doing that, that is when we are doing really good work together." It is purely coincidence that a similar term, "discovering common ground," has become widely used in the organizational literature to describe the future search conference approach to collaborative planning (Weisbord, 1992). Although utilizing different methodologies, we share in the search to find a solid base from which all can stand. Other terminology was scrutinized as well. Originally, I thought about parent professional partnerships. Michael White proposed the terms "service providers," "service seekers," and "service planners." While I preferred these, they too posed difficulties. It was hard to escape dualistic, either/or thinking that overlooks that everybody is actually providing services and learning from each other. While people come together around specific roles and activities, it is the connections with each other that really matter. Services sounds so one-sided, as though one person receives and the other one gives. But something much more reciprocal occurs than doing something for someone. As articulated by Peter, a mental health provider, "In the engagement, it is a gift to be able to participate openly on either side." Often I was struck by the limits of language. Many of the terms I used were brought into question. I had originally spoken about "level-playing field" experiences, until a participant spoke up: "I would like to throw out the term, 'level playing field' and just get rid of it, because I always think of football teams, and that is not what I think of when I think of us working together." I tried to keep a playful open mind, and I laughed a lot. "You guys are asking me to throw out all of my original terms. First role transcendence, then service seekers, service providers and service planners, and now level playing field! What's next?" Prudence responded: "Why don't you throw out 'psychology,' and 'organizational development' while you are at it! Throw them all out!"
Dissertation Outline As action-oriented research, this project focused on both generating knowledge and producing action (Park, 1999). The dissertation cross-pollinated the fields of human services, narrative therapy, and organizational inquiry. My hope was to link fields of inquiry that share emancipatory values and commitment to social change. I also want to contribute to the emergent literature on narrative approaches to organizational change (Barry, 1997; Simons, 1998). Although many people have had combined experiences as service seeker, provider, and planner, they came into the research conversations in designated roles. In chapter 7, the reader has the opportunity to take perspective of each of these roles and to hear firsthand how participants described their experiences as help-seekers and help-givers. Parents spoke about their anger, emergent self-confidence, friendship, and parent-to-parent support. Providers described their earnest commitment to family-centered practices, the dilemmas posed by paperwork, the professional agenda, and their own learning curves. Planners identified unique features of roles that are removed from direct service work and are often in positions of power. Several participants spoke about the unique challenges posed by straddling multiple roles. In chapter 8, I explore the specific narrative practices utilized in research interviews. The participants identified themes that contribute both to a theoretical understanding of common ground experiences, as well as to real effects on their lives and relationships. Sharing common ground experiences helped to re-story people's self-knowledge and sense of community. Ripple effects were evident in the activities through which people approached power relations and parent-professional partnerships. When I began this project, my focus was on experiences when human service seekers, providers, and planners move out of the grip of "us and them" positioning to engage in earnest dialogue as human beings with a shared commitment to address the needs of children. I was excited to realize that this phenomenon fit well in narrative terms as "a unique outcome." As the interviews progressed, I saw the theme of power relations as more central to the concept of common ground experiences. The research inquiry unearthed several themes regarding power relations in the help-giving relationship, as explored in chapter 9. Throughout, parents eloquently articulated the need for ally-to-ally support and meaningful involvement. Co-researchers discussed possibilities and constraints associated with implicit rules of engagement and confidentiality as a professional discourse. Common ground experiences-- ally-to-ally support, effective help-giving, and meaningful parent involvement-- all are based on relationships that express friendship skills and which contradict the established practice of professional distancing. Many participants emphasized the centrality of relationships in effective help-giving and meaningful family involvement in human services. Chapter 10 explores relationship building, the relevance of friendship skills, and the challenges that this poses to professional discourses. Chapter 11 looks at three aspects of partnership accountability in human services: parents' accounts of the effects of professionals on their lives and relationships, professionals' thinking and actions as they hold themselves accountable to parents' recommendations, and personal reflections on the impact of these conversations on my own professional development. The research findings point to the need for safe conversational contexts in which service seekers can speak and be heard about what they have learned through their life experiences. As reflective practitioners, service providers and planners need safe contexts in which to explore their personal accountability, so that they can take professional risks to question their assumptions and established practices. This poses implications for systems change and training to integrate theory and practice, professional and family training, and partnerships between parents and professionals. In chapter 12, I offer recommendations made by people experienced in providing learning opportunities for professionals which focus on family support. Finally, chapter 13 summarizes the conclusions, and looks at the implications, theoretical significance, and directions for future research.
This dissertation chronicles the unfolding of common ground experiences, and the underlying power relations between human service seekers, providers, and planners. It utilized a narrative metaphor to highlight exchanges between participants that re-story experiences to move beyond "us" and "them" to finding common ground. As the research got underway, I found it helpful to envision readers as witnesses to a play that follows the development of certain themes within a particular context by a cast of characters. This chapter sets the stage, including a description of the Vermont context, the research cast of characters, and the sensitivity of the research topic. Vermont Context This project heightened my awareness of Vermont as an unusual place with exceptional people. While I do not want to contribute to the idealization of Vermont by East Coast city dwellers looking for vacation homes, I was awestruck by the collective wisdom and community spirit of the seekers, providers, and planners that were my co-researchers. People strive to "walk the talk" of community building, collaboration, and dialogue. Still, there is a long way to go. The climate in Vermont was ripe for this research project. There was change in the air and receptivity to family-centered, community-based human services. I asked participants what they think is unique about living in Vermont, and how the Vermont culture informs human services, and the power relations between service seekers, providers, and planners. Participants described Vermont as a uniquely rural state with a longstanding tradition of community mindedness, resourcefulness, and utilitarianism. Many people aspire to live by what Jeree Pawl has called "the platinum rule: Do unto others, as you would have others do unto others" (Pawl, 1996). In the words of one human service provider: "A value in Vermont is that people are really working for the good of the community. I get the sense in a lot of other places that people are working only for themselves. That may be a really false perception, but it just seems that way. It's like, 'me first!' And that is not the way it is in Vermont. This is because you see your neighbors in small town life." Preserving Vermont's rural traditions is a contentious issue that engages many people at the local level. There is widespread appreciation for the environment and concern about the effects of rapid growth. While there are significant political differences among Vermonters, government is accessible. The annual Town Meeting is a good example of a community process in which both traditionalists and newcomers speak. People can vocally disagree on town politics, yet still be considered good neighbors. The pace of life has been slower in Vermont. This is a source of pride, as described by one human service planner: "Vermonters like the fact of progress happening slower here than other places. Somebody once said, 'There are two things that we don't like in Vermont. We don't like the way things are, and we don't like change!'" Even in rural, small town Vermont, a time squeeze is impacting on family life. This has real effects on opportunities for relationship building between service seekers and service providers. Parents spoke about having to do "a lot of running, a lot of phone calls, a lot of confusion." While there are now often many possibilities for help, both providers and parents expressed concern over fragmentation and the lack of a cohesive system of care. One grandmother reflected on differences between when she was a struggling parent and what she observes for her granddaughter: "I think services are getting to be better, especially because (my granddaughter) does have the services. But a lot of times we are just running from one place to the other. The grandparent is involved too. It's really difficult. …there is no time." Vermont has been idealized by many as a haven for a progressive, idyllic, simplified lifestyle. While it is a remarkable place to call one's home, it faces significant problems. In particular, there are far too many children growing up in poverty. Services are fragmented and uneven. Services often are not available to families with young children. Our human services systems do not make it easy for people to ask for help. Relations with professionals are also mixed. As one parent said, "I would say out of my experience it's 50-50&emdash;people who have really good attitudes and who are really friendly, but its always those really negative ones who really stand out. " Ethnicity and Socio-Economic Class While Vermont has less ethnic diversity than other states, there is a growing ethnic diversity in Burlington, the largest city in Vermont. Vermonters include many people of French Canadian descent whose names have now become Americanized. In recent years, Croatian, Tibetan, and Vietnamese refuges have been settling throughout the state. Vermont life is full of paradoxes. Christie, the director of a parent/child center, described the Vermont tradition of tolerance combined with a less diverse population: "Living in Wyoming for 15 years, my sense is that Vermont is much less rigid in its gender role definitions and it is overall a much more tolerant state when it comes to individual differences. At the same time, we don't have the ethnic diversity here." Another example can be found in Vermont's legislative choices, which combine Republican, Democratic, and Socialist legislators at the local, state, and federal levels. These diverse voices are currently immersed in debating the "civil union bill," groundbreaking legislation that has now passed the Vermont House of Representatives, offering legal rights and protection to gay and lesbian couples. Status and materialism less inform standards of living in Vermont than many other parts of the United States. People tend to have less money. There are also considerable class differences and economic diversity. Tourists who idealize Vermont do not usually see the underlying poverty. In April 1999, the Vermont Agency of Human Services published an extensive status report on the social well-being of Vermonters based on social indicators of how well Vermont was achieving its outcomes (Murphey, 1999). This chronicles Vermont's significant reductions in child abuse and neglect, teen pregnancies and childbearing. Vermont has one of the lowest crime rates in the nation and ranks high on many measures of health. At the same time, Vermont has high rates of substance abuse by teens and adults. Per capita incomes and wages in Vermont are lower than national averages, and there are insufficient "livable wage" jobs. Many Vermonters live with economic hardship, dependent on multiple jobs and/or dual incomes. Roughly one Vermont child in eight lives below the poverty line, one in four lives with a single parent, and child support payments are never collected in more than half of the cases (p. 35). Economic diversity is reflected in governance groups in Vermont more than in other parts of the country. This is partially true because there is less cultural diversity; Vermont is also a very small state, with a population of about _ million people. This means that people have more opportunities to participate in local government, and citizens have easy access to public officials.
Research Cast of Characters When I embarked on this research project, I assumed that participants' contributions would be kept anonymous. As the project emerged, I was stunned by the eloquence of people's words. I wanted to acknowledge people for their considerable contributions. I then contacted many of the people whose quotes I chose; nearly everyone gave me permission to use their real names. In writing the dissertation, I caught myself recreating exactly what one parent, Prudence, warned against. Whereas the parents were "untitled," I gave lengthy descriptions to the providers and planners. I knew I wanted to treat everyone the same. As a result, I invited co-researchers to become part of a "research cast of characters who's who," similar to what might be found in the program to a play. Many people chose this option and agreed to come out from beneath the masks of their designated roles. I thoroughly enjoyed the process of helping participants construct their biographies. Their stories became references that I referred to repeatedly as inspiration during the long hours of dissertation writing. I questioned how to integrate this cast of characters into the dissertation. Should it be included as part of the dissertation text or as an appendix? What descriptors should I use to introduce people in the body of the text, and how closely should I link their quotes to the actual actors? Should the "who's who" be organized in alphabetical order of first or last names? Each of these decisions seemed important, especially as I tried to create a context that would not elevate the voices of planners and providers over those of service seekers. It was helpful to bring these questions to my dissertation committee, and to have their reminder that mirroring this reflexive process was just as important as describing the actual decisions made. My decisions reflect a certain tension between fostering common ground experiences and honoring research ethics. I had an ethical commitment not to expose participants to any public scrutiny that might bring discomfort. At the same time, I wanted to mirror the dissertation findings that accent the shared humanity of participants. I reflected upon a similar tension in my work as a family therapist which has led me to explore creative possibilities with the people who come to consult me. I have discovered that people can give permission to intentionally share their story with others. My hope was to find similar ways to bend the rules of confidentiality in research context. Always, this was done with permission. In most situations, I identified co-researchers by their first names in the text of the dissertation. There were a couple of exceptions. Since there were two mothers named Pam, I used the last initial for their last name. I also reflected a lot about how to quote Michael White. While I wanted to treat him exactly like others, there were additional considerations. Through our collaboration, I came to think of Michael as a friend. At the same time, Michael White continues to be my mentor: someone whose thinking and practices profoundly influence my frame of reference. Thus, I was acutely aware of the privilege and responsibility posed by his participation. Because of Michael White's world known stature, he faced greater risks of public scrutiny. Through conversation and email, I tried to carefully check with Michael about how to describe his participation, and to handle this dilemma. Thus, there were times when I identified Michael White by his full name, or by his first name, while at other times his participation was anonymous. There were over 75 participants in this research study. I would have liked to give all co-researchers the option of participating in the "who's who," Instead, I chose 32 "actors" who convey the passion, integrity, and complexity of lives beneath designated roles. People are arranged alphabetically by their last names. This makes it a bit more challenging to connect people with their exact quotes, but this is not really necessary. What is most important is to capture the powerful presence of participants in this research project.
"Who's Who"
Ellie Anderson has worked with children and adults with serious mental illness since 1984, as a psychotherapist, case manager, and administrator. Currently, she is the area manager for the community mental health center in Windsor County, Vermont. The work that she does is very much connected to who she is as a person. Ellie has a very joyful spirit, a love for people, nature, and art. She has always worked with a sense of adventure, valuing her connections with people, meeting them where they are, even if this means breaking rules. Ellie is living her own Cinderella story. For 13 years, she was a battered woman; she understands well what it is like to live with terror and violence. She became a graduate student in counseling psychology with two preschoolers and continued when she became pregnant with her third child. Her first husband, a complicated man with many wonderful qualities, suffered deeply from depression and took his own life. Today, the grief bursts forth more like a fresh spring rain than crusting over like snow on a winter meadow. Ellie attributes her extended family for sustaining her children and her through hard times. Now she is happily remarried, the mother of five fabulous children in a blended family where everyone truly loves each other. There is much that makes her grateful.
Christie Binzen is the director of the Orange-County Parent/Child Center, and the coordinator of the Vermont Parent/Child Center network. Having lived in rural Wyoming for 15 years, she moved to Vermont to be near her family. Although she had worked for years in early childhood services, at first Christie did not know what parent/child centers were. She did know that she wanted to become part of the contagious energy. As the mother of two adult children, she remembers the support and care it takes to raise young children, and how she used to yearn for connections with other families. Christie has been a single parent for 10 years. She loves being in nature and with people. Everyday, she remembers the absolute privilege to live in a beautiful place like Vermont. Now she wants to experience other places as well. She has just completed her application to the Peace Corps.
Charlie Biss is the parent of two children, Alexandra and Andrew. He has worked in human services for 26 years, as a practitioner, local program developer and state administrator. Currently, he is the director of the Child, Adolescent and Family Unit within the Vermont Department of Mental Health and Developmental Services. Having studied in the seminary for 7 years, Charlie's work is guided by his spiritual mission. As a lifelong community organizer, Charlie wants to push the Vermont tradition of care and community to its furthest extreme so that community cares about all of its members. He is a founding member of the Committee for Temporary Shelter and the Vermont chapter of the Alliance for the Mentally Ill. Charlie keeps learning more and more how not to stereotype or make assumptions and to look toward the recipients of care for the answers. In retrospect, Charlie can see how his own family's mental health and substance abuse issues drew him to the field. About 10 years ago, he learned that his grandmother died in a state mental institution. Charlie loves sports, especially baseball, kayaking, skiing, and marathon running. When not playing, he is coaching his children's teams.
Bruce Chalmer's name comes from "Chelmer" which, in Yiddish folklore, is a resident of Chelm, a mythical city of fools. Bruce is proud of how he has always had a sense of being a little bit clueless. He rarely wants to accept a dominant structure as a given. Instead, Bruce has a passion to discover permeability in solid boxes; he often wonders how the solid walls of any particular box have been constructed. Bruce works as a family therapist with individuals, families, and other various groupings. He feels privileged to do such sacred work, within the Jewish tradition of "Tikkum Olam" or repairing the world. Bruce is involved in other Jewish traditions as well, such as music, singing, preparing children for Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, and exploring Jewish liturgical practice. The father of three boys, Bruce is the youngest of three brothers, and his father was the youngest of three sons. That means that his son, Eli, is the youngest of the youngest of the youngest of three sons. Bruce is married to a poet and writer who is a passionate explorer of other possibilities. It is through the powerful experience of marriage that he found his curiosity about possibilities for transformation, and an awareness of how profoundly things can change when assumptions are examined. Bruce is intensely interested in ways that men can understand their ways of being, to examine their effects on the world, and to become available to be in the world differently. Bruce also enjoys demystifying technology; he has written a textbook on statistics as well as several statistical software packages, and teaches about data communications.
Jan Crow coordinates Springfield Early Essential Education (EEE), a program that provides services for children and infants identified with developmental delays or handicapping conditions. In the mid 1970s, she moved from Michigan to Boston to study music and work with inner-city teenagers in a drop-in center providing crisis intervention, drug and alcohol prevention, and co-leading wilderness experiences. She soon realized there was a greater opportunity to have positive impact by working with younger children, so she went back to school to study early childhood education. In 1983, she received her M.Ed. with a specialty in severe emotional disturbance and autism. Jan has two young children, ages 8 and 4, one of whom has sensory and learning issues; she understands well what it is like to be a parent trying to access services. Music is an important part of life for Jan and her children; she sings in a women's chorus, plays the flute, and was recently trained to teach the Suzuki method. Her son, Zachary, plays the Suzuki violin, and her daughter, Olivia, studies Suzuki flute. Jan is married to Michael Zerphy, a mime, clown, storyteller and puppeteer. They love the clear sense of community, collective interest in arts, and support for quality education in their small Vermont town where they recently moved. They are especially happy to be living right down the road from the newly established Green Mountain Buddhist Dharma Center where nuns and monks have created a community in connection with Thich Nhat Hanh and the Plum Village in France. This has brought meditation, mindfulness, and spiritual grounding to their whole family.
By profession, Carol D'Antonio is a nurse, having held many different positions, from staff nursing at a hospital to designing and selling first aid rooms to industry, education and recreation facilities. Currently, she works at a mental health center specializing in family support. This position fits the most comfortably, since for years she was a single parent of three boys and truly understands the demands that single parenting present. After a second marriage, Carol's fourth child was born prematurely and diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Now, as a parent, she navigates the human services system including schools, which can be most disturbing at times. Carol enjoys old movies; reading is always a pleasure that is not far away. She loves to look up at the sky with or without a telescope, especially in Vermont.
As a kid, Amy Darley always wanted to be a singing, dancing doctor. Her passion for music, movement, and drama was transformed into street and dance theatre on Indian reservations, in prisons, at migrant camps and summer camp, in barns and living rooms. Amy also choreographs community celebrations, early childhood and family services, and connections between people. She strives to make things better for children and families. In her current job, she acts as a liaison regarding human services between Vermont constituents and Senator Jim Jeffords's office. Her goal is to be as accessible as possible so that people can have a voice in public policy and community development. Amy is the mother of two adult children with whom she loves to spend time, especially outdoors.
Judy Davidson is a family therapist who works with three colleagues at Brattleboro Family Therapy Associates. She believes that all her experiences as a daughter, sister, wife, and mother have helped her understand both the joys and tribulations of the families who consult with her. She finds her work very satisfying, and feels it is a privilege to be able to hear the life stories of her clients and to be able to help them make the changes they want in their lives. In her free time, Judy enjoys gardening, traveling, being with her "little sister," taking part in many outdoor sports and being involved in her community.
Nancy DiVenere is the parent of three children, the youngest of whom propelled her into her life's work. When Brett was born, the uncertainty about his future fostered her need to talk to other parents and to build a network of peer support for other families. Now, Nancy is filled with joy to think about how much her family can celebrate including the anticipation of Brett's upcoming graduation from college. Surrounded by a wonderful circle of support, Nancy works for the abundance of community in others' lives. She is the director of Parent-to-parent of Vermont. Her work is a total immersion and family affair to which everyone in the family has contributed. Married to her soulmate for over 30 years, she could never have done what she has done without his loving support and partnership. Whenever possible, Nancy loves to be with her children and husband, especially in the outdoors where they love to hike and to cross-country ski. Pam Doyle is 24, the mother of Beth, Deryk, and Taliesin. Children and friendships are what are most important to her. Since she had her children when she was very young, Pam was forced to grow up very fast. Friends remind her that she has children, and that even though she's young, she needs to be old and boring. Pam's sense of humor is a way she copes: If she can laugh about it, it can't be all that bad. Through her friendship with Prudence, she has become increasingly involved in community and statewide groups such as her local early childhood action team, Head Start, the Family Consortium, and reflective supervision. She also goes to anything else that she gets dragged to. In her younger years, she had a hard time in school. Her mother had no education. She knows she wants her children to get a good education, to go to college, to be self-sufficient, and to move out into the world with whatever makes them happy. Pam loves arts and crafts of any kind. Whenever she can, she has her nose in books. She especially loves to read anything about King Arthur and medieval history. Pam gave her daughter the name Taliesin from The Mists of Avalon, which she has read time and time again.
Joyce DuBack has worked as a professional with children and families for over 30 years. She is the director of instructional and family support for the Springfield School District in Vermont. About 4 years ago, her elderly parents came to live with her. Her father is 93 and has Alzheimer's; her mother is 89, disabled with diabetes and a hearing impairment. Now, as a consumer of services, Joyce feels like she understands the frustration and anger that parents sometimes feel when dealing with a provider system that is not always responsive to their family's needs. When she sees how difficult it is for someone with professional experience to navigate through the system, Joyce wonders what it is like for a family who isn't as knowledgeable or self-confident. This has opened her eyes to inherent problems in how our system treats parents. Remarried, Joyce has a 36-year-old daughter, six stepchildren, and 12 grandchildren. She loves to sing, play the piano, listen to music, travel, golf, and work out at the gym.
Ken Epstein is a father of a 9-year-old girl named Hannah and a partner to Ann. By profession, Ken is a social worker, which has been a great fit. He has a passion for participating with children, adolescents, families, staff, and friends in problem solving and inquisitive conversations. Ken's work has ranged from clinical, programmatic to administrative responsibilities. He is currently the executive director of the Northeastern Family Institute in Vermont, a set of intensive programs for adolescents in crisis. Ken is also a sports enthusiast; he runs marathons, plays basketball, and skis as much as he can. Participation in athletics was so important, Ken included a line about it in his wedding vows. Fortunately, Ann is understanding.
Julie Finkle grew up with seven siblings in a family with many problems. She is determined to break her family's cycle of abuse so that her child does not have to live the life that she has lived. As the mother of an 11-year-old son with emotional behavioral difficulties, life is always a challenge. Her life opened to new possibilities when she became connected to a family advocate, Judy Sturtevant, who worked with The Vermont Federation of Families for Children's Mental Health. Gradually, Julie started to work for this organization; she now works there fulltime. Her greatest goal is to work with other families to make their lives a little easier, just like Judy did for her. Julie collects music boxes and loves to read. Someday she wants to write a book.
Jane Kast has been with children and families all of her life. Ever since she was a little girl, Jane has believed in happiness and in finding happiness through talking. A passion for change has carried her through several careers. She is entranced by the magic of working with people in organizations, groups, and families. While making a lot of money in the creative department of a corporation, Jane used to think about how she could reinvent her life and still make a decent living. When she realized she couldn't become the corporate vice president of conversation development, she decided to become a family therapist instead. Jane greatly values independent thinking and sees possibilities others might not see. She attributes this to her interesting parents who always insisted on following their own ways, independent of cultural expectations. A good example is their last-minute decision to put off getting married so that they could use their limited money to consult with a psychic horse. Jane lives with her husband, two teenage daughters, two Welsh corgis, two cats, and a bird. She also likes to read mysteries and to travel.
Elvin Kaplan is a pediatrician who has practiced in rural Vermont for 25 years. He is blessed by a marriage of similar duration to a woman who has gotten him to understand that the fourth law of thermodynamics is "the problem is the problem, not the person." His other interests include the violin, racquetball, a flock of chickens, and a flock of kids, grown and scattered throughout the USA.
Sara Kobylenski is a social worker who marvels at all that she learns from the people who in theory she is helping. Sara has worked as a social worker in child welfare settings for over 30 years, including juvenile corrections, residential treatment, foster care, adoption, family-based services, and child protective services. She feels a responsibility to push the parameters of systems, and to see how adaptive, flexible, and responsive they can become for the people they were designed to serve. Improvements do not come easily, and the strategies she tries do not always work, but she hopes to learn something from every experience. As the director of the Vermont Division of Casey Family Services, Sara strives to create an environment that supports social workers and families to discover together how to make possibilities happen. Sara appreciates the opportunity in Vermont to play a lot of different roles that express her abiding interest in children: as parent, school board member, and supporter of community ventures such as 4-H. She believes in reciprocity that involves give and take according to basic rules of respect. That way, we do not need to make up a lot of rules; we can take risks to swim deep, knowing that in different contexts we are all service seekers.
Georgia Milkowski works at the Springfield Parent/Child Center to develop resources, training, and newsletters for licensed and registered child care providers. She also runs a referral service to help parents find childcare, which sometimes includes subsidy. Georgia is a people person. A few years ago, she started a children's center called Playworks. Now that she works primarily with parents, Georgia stays connected with children by facilitating a playgroup as well as a "Parents Together" children's group for Prevent Child Abuse Vermont. Having worked with families with young children for 21 years, she attributes this commitment to having had a really tough time growing up through her youth. Georgia moved to Vermont with her husband and two children in search of a healthy environment to raise children. She has learned a great deal from her son who challenges her to accept him for who he is and to accommodate his learning style. Her eyes have been opened by the amount of advocating she has had to do to prevent her son from being labeled and for the school environment to make simple adjustments. Georgia loves listening to jazz and blues and being active in the outdoors.
Courtney Messer McKaig approaches life as a quiet revolution to create a peaceful world. She strongly believes we each can make a difference, no matter how small, by contributing positive energy to our communities. Courtney is grateful for having grown up in a very loving family, and now to live with her loving husband, Colin, and 2-year-old son, Coleman. Taking care of her son is the most important work that she does. Courtney has also worked in a fully integrated lab preschool for children with autism. Her steadfast belief in inclusion for all children has propelled a commitment to early intervention, strategies for integrated classrooms, community psychology, and empirically based research. Currently, she works for a non-profit preschool and as a behavioral consultant for local school systems. She also participates in the local Success By Six Council and Children's Upstream Services Advisory Committee.
Cheryl Mitchell lives with her family on a sheep farm in Vermont and is filled with the joy of three generations living and working together in a beautiful place. She works for the Vermont Agency of Human Services as the deputy secretary and loves having a chance to work on social policy for children and families with people from all over the state. Her long-time favorite groups to work with and for are toddlers and teenagers, and she believes that if we could create communities in which these age groups thrive we will have created places that are wonderful for people of all ages to live. For many years she was privileged to work at the Addison County Parent/Child Center; an agency that supports parents in the challenging and wonderful job of raising children by providing love, education, training, good food, and good humor. Being a member of a Quaker Meeting has been an important part of her life, and working with friends to create programs, especially those that involve babies, is a source of joy.
Lee Monro began a career in family therapy long before she had ever heard of such a thing, having grown up as the family listener. She now realizes that she was drawn to therapy both because it seemed like a match with her own skills and interests, and because as a young person trying to become a client of therapy, she had experienced disrespect and dishonoring, and she knew she could do better just by being a good and nice person. Lee has also been strongly influenced by motherhood, partnership, friendship, and feminism. She is partnered with her husband, Elvin Kaplan, with whom she shares a rich history. She is the mother of two adult daughters and stepmother of three all of whom have made worthy contributions to her education, having taught her that sometimes not knowing is as valued as knowing. Close-harmony singing (which, like therapy, requires great listening) is currently a very happy pastime, providing some of that longed for balance in life between work and play. When they are not reveling in their good fortune at being able to spend a lot of their time on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, Lee and Elvin live in a farmhouse at the base of southeastern Vermont's Mt. Ascutney, which has been a lovely playground and a quiet retreat for them for 25 years.
Isabelle Nichols is the mother of three challenging children. She comes from a family with a long history of abuse and has had to fight so that her children can have the stable life that she never had. She is very determined to not let her past interfere with her children's future. She has learned a lot through all the advocating she has had to do for her children. She loves to draw, spend time outdoors, and to play with children.
Prudence Pease has grown from being a young homeless teen on the streets to a stable mother of six living a normal life on a dairy farm in rural Vermont. She is blessed with a loving and supportive husband, Johnny, who carries the strength to allow her to be who she is. He is the fourth generation of rural Vermont dairy farmers. Together with extended family, they farm 130 head of Guernsey and Holstein cattle, of which 70 head are milked. Pru lends her voice to advocate for parents and children to have power in the community and to negotiate through the system. She believes everyone can speak just as loudly, whether it is someone on ANFC or the doctor who lives down the road. Surrounded by thousands of perennials, Pru finds peace in the garden. Their family goal is to be fully homesteading within 5 years, so that everything will come from the farm. Currently, they are rebuilding an orchard that Johnny's father first planted.
Lori Peterson's days are filled with children. She is the mother of two young children, Nick and Hope, who are very different, although both have been diagnosed with autism. It is her love for her children that keeps her going. She is committed to making sure that they have the best, so they can get as much out of life as possible. She tries to stay upbeat, although this is not always easy in the winter, when it is harder to get outside. Her husband works nights, and she and her children are often alone during the day. Lori has lived in Vermont for 14 years. The last 4 years have been in a very quiet town in the Champlain Islands where no one is there but the locals when it is not tourist season. Although she hates the cold, there is something that draws her to the lake, especially experiencing the seasons. When she gets a break, Lori loves to read fiction about someone else's life. Recently, her family got a golden retriever puppy. When her daughter is in school, Lori likes to work with another child with special needs. She realizes that not everyone knows what it takes to make sure that kids have the best.
Over the years, Peggy Sax has witnessed many courageous changes made by families and individuals when they face personal challenges. Whether in a professional role or as the seeker of services, it is those moments of meeting person to person that are most memorable. This has inspired her to move outside the realm of therapy to explore ways to facilitate social change. Returning to school every decade has provided reflective respite from the intensity of her work as a practitioner. Peggy's home is in the Vermont countryside, where she lives with her life's partner, Shel. Becoming a Fielding student has helped buffer the transition in which their two sons, Peter and Jordan, have become adults and stepped out into the wide(r) world. Everyday, Peggy feels a profound gratefulness for her family, friends, community, and for meaningful life's work with people who teach her so much.
Jim Squires currently works with the Vermont Department of Education as the early childhood education consultant, a job he has held for 10 years which is the longest he's ever stayed in one place. In previous positions, Jim has been a preschool and kindergarten teacher, child care provider and director, administrator of Head Start and migrant education programs, and college instructor. He is committed to preserving childhood for young children. Having recently completed his Ph.D. in Child Development and Public Policy from the Union Institute in Cincinnati, he hopes to return to his passions of teaching scuba diving, traveling to out-of-the-way places, and playing with his blue-eyed dog, Stella. Jim is ecstatically married to his college sweetheart, Debbie, and loves living in the woods of Charlotte, Vermont.
Pam Sullivan is the mother of three teenagers. She is still learning about herself, what effect she has on others, and what work she wants to do. Since a child, she has had a passion for helping other people. Her extended family members have been hit hard with challenges, and she has had a lot of practice in learning how to help others. She has also had to face her share of challenges and life stresses. Having lived through many frustrating experiences, she has learned the hard way that people have to work together in order to get something accomplished, especially when a child has a problem. Pam loves the greenery and the woods of Vermont, she loves animals, and to play with her cat, rabbits, and pet rats. As an air force brat, Pam moved around a lot as a child. In researching her roots, she recently discovered that her great-great grandfather was born in Vermont.
Mark Sustic lives in Fletcher, Vermont with his wife, Deborah, and their teenage son, Tom. Mark has worked as a professional musician in Canada and the US. He loves to organize and present cultural events, having founded several non-profit arts organizations in Vermont. Since 1973, Mark has worked with young children in Michigan and Vermont; at large state-operated residential institutions, federally funded research projects, an alternate high school, and early childhood special education programs. Currently, he is Coordinator of the Franklin County Early Childhood Programs and the Franklin County Success by Six Project. Mark has a passion for community-based programs that make a difference to families with young children with disabilities. He has very personal connections to his chosen profession. His parents were teenagers, and they both sacrificed a great deal due to the pregnancy. Mark and his younger brother had seizure disorders, which required constant medication and monitoring by neurologists and other medical specialists throughout their early childhood and teenage years. Mark received weekly speech and language pathology services in elementary school. Mark is the father of a child with a hearing loss who has been receiving specialized audiological and speech and language services since 18 months of age, including hearing aids and regular speech and language therapy. Now in high school, his son was recently diagnosed with an extremely rare form of leukemia and is awaiting a life-saving bone marrow transplant. Their circle of support throughout these hard times includes family, friends, colleagues, community and health professionals, who are collectively offering whatever they can to be of support and help.
Anne Wallace loves to work with parents of young children. Being a mother is an extremely important part of her life. Among other things, her children teach her about letting go, especially as they get older. She is always amazed at the creativity and care that people show with their own and other people's children. Anne is a musician and loves to harmonize with other singers. She sings songs of hope and solidarity with a women's quartet called "Spider Moon." She also absolutely loves singing with very young children because they are so utterly open to delight in the simplest songs. Anne started in special education, then gravitated toward family and mental health work. In the last 30 years, she has seen a lot. Anne is proud to be a social worker. She has worked at the Addison County Parent/Child Center for nearly two decades. She loves being part of the community there that includes very young parents, families struggling with tough times, and coworkers and their families. Sharing meals, celebrations, and routines means that she can always count on someone to keep a positive spin on things. Anne does not think children's mental health is rocket science. Parents need to feel validated and supported so they can give their young children love, routine, support, and stability to thrive. She likes to lighten up heavy, pretentious talk, and gets impatient, even cranky, when she has to deal with layers of bureaucracy. Anne really loves to spend time on the couch eating chocolate chip cookies and reading women's fiction and memoirs.
Michael White lives in Adelaide, South Australia. He manages a good balance between his various interests in therapy, teaching/training, and working with communities of people, and being with family and friends and an outdoor life. The opportunity to travel with his work has made it possible for him to make connections with many people from all over with whom he shares interests. He finds these connections constantly revitalizing.
K.C.Whiteley can trace her interest in advocacy back as early as first grade, when she saw how some people are picked on and treated differently. Since then, she has been committed to advocate for all people to be treated with the same basic respect. K.C.'s involvement with advocacy work drew her into Community Action, Head Start, and the world of early childhood care and education. Her current position as the director of the State-Head Start Collaboration office places her as a liaison so that early childhood programs and people can work together more closely for the benefit of kids and families. K.C. is particularly excited about spreading Parent and Community Leadership courses throughout Vermont, so that people can develop the skills and confidence they need to make changes for the better in their own communities. While she can sometimes get impatient with the slow process of change that often feels like pushing a big rock up a hill, she knows that it takes time and long-term commitment to develop the leadership and positive relationships that sustainable change requires. Meditation and studying Buddhism have helped center and bring balance into her life. She shares her life-long love of outdoors and camping with her partner and two wonderful daughters. As she gets older, K.C. looks forward to taking more risks, and to becoming less tied to a paycheck. She enjoys listening to jazz and soul music and singing in women's a cappella and doo-wop singing groups. If she could choose a reincarnation, K.C. would want to come back as one of Aretha's back-up singers in the "Sweet Inspirations."
Jo Yoder is both an adoptive and a biological parent. She is the program director for Parent-to-parent, a family organization that offers family support to parents of children with special needs. Having gone through some challenging years, her daughter has taught Jo a lot about not putting people in boxes, and to look at children as individuals; Jo's daughter continues to teach her everyday. Jo is also an educator, having taught elementary school, English as a second language, and adult education. She believes in lifelong learning that makes us grow and change. Living in Nepal for 12 years was a life-changing experience, giving Jo a broader worldview to see how the life she has lived is very different than the larger percentage of people on this planet. Jo struggles with how to fit and live together in a global society.
Susan Yuan coordinates Family Support at the Center on Disability and Community Inclusion at the University of Vermont. She offers training on family support and on inclusion in education around the country. She is perennially optimistic about systems change, but knows how long it takes. Susan has three grown children who were raised in Taiwan and Hong Kong; her youngest son has autism and still lives at home. She was a single parent for 10 years, and understands the stresses of blended families with a member with disabilities. She loves to travel, hike, camp, river raft, and plays the viola in chamber music groups.
Sensitivity of Research Topic The topic of parent-professional relationships is an emotional issue, especially for parents who depend on human services to meet their children's special needs. It took courage to speak about such personal matters in front of an audience, especially in "mixed company" of seekers, providers, and planners. Participants also gave their permission to have video edits shown to subsequent interviews. I felt a tremendous sense of responsibility to create a safe and trusting environment conducive to earnest dialogue. Whenever possible, I tried to acknowledge my appreciation for people taking the risk to speak up about such sensitive matters and to encourage participants to share only what they felt comfortable sharing. One parent at a community CUPS gathering reflected on the embarrassment she felt watching herself in a video edit from a previous gathering: "I hadn't watched it before now. The emotions were there and it did capture what we were feeling. And now to see it again&emdash;especially since the feelings are so close to my heart. We are sharing ALL of us here, and that was a little hard to relive. The feelings are very real and very strong." Prudence, a mother of six with many stories to tell, described some of the risks that she takes by sharing her experiences with providers. Several parents told very personal stories about their children within a reflecting team format, at a recent CUPS Team meeting. Prudence spoke graphically about the decisions she had made and the effects that they had on her child, believing that her child's mental health problems were a direct result of choices she had made when he was very young: "I chose to subject him to drug abuse and very heavy domestic violence--every evil, poor decision that a parent could make." The whole time she was talking, she was aware that there was a person from Child Protective Services in the room. She knew where she was every second: "Every time she crossed the room--when she got her cupcake--I noticed. When she got her ice cream, I knew where she was." Somehow, she found the courage to tell her, "I'm scared to death of you, and what I said." They then sat down and talked it over. "But if we hadn't gotten to the point where we are now, I would have continued every time I walked into that room to go, 'She knows what I said, she knows what I did. It was 12 years ago. But she KNOWS.' " Yet, despite these vulnerabilities, people told personal stories and spoke from their hearts about the search for common ground experiences between seekers, providers, and planners. I see this as an indicator of the relevance of the topic. People often seemed relieved to have a context in which to discuss their experiences within parent-professional relationships. They spoke with personal authority about what they learned along the way, and how these accrued knowledge can be put into action. The spirit of inquiry was truly contagious, and people often asked each other lots of questions. Collectively, they deconstructed many of the cultural and professional discourses that inform the power relations between professional helpers and the seekers of services. Some of the parents I consulted were newer to such conversations and somehow found the courage to speak up about both their frustrations and their positive experiences with professionals. Other parents had already spent many years struggling to create collaborative systems of care for their children and radiated a wealth of knowledge about family support programs, advocacy, and self-determination. Most of the providers had years of experience that informed a personal awareness of highlights and dilemmas. Many of the participants straddled multiple roles and identified strongly as both service seeker and service provider. While most people had experience as local planners in community-based planning ventures, only a few primarily identified themselves as planners. Several people who held current jobs as state or federal planners related strongly as parents, and all had prior experience as service providers. While I brought the research question, we shared a collective passion for the topic. Throughout, I was aware that I was entering an ongoing conversation with a history, present, and future. A lot of people have been thinking about parent-professional partnerships for a long time. I was tapping into a collective wisdom that draws from people's experiences as parents and familiarity with such fields of inquiry as early childhood care and education, mental health, health care, social work, family therapy, community development, and organizational systems.
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