When More Services Doesn’t Mean Better Care
Can someone be surrounded by helping professionals and still feel unsupported? Exploring fragmented care, institutional barriers, and the challenges of navigating multiple service systems, I reflect on why meaningful support requires more than providing resources—it requires coordination, accountability, and understanding the whole person.
What I Learned When I Realized How Much I Didn't Know
What happens when an educational experience challenges everything we thought we understood about culture? Reflecting on my immersion experience with the Lakota community in South Dakota, I explore Indigenous history, spirituality, child welfare, and the importance of cultural humility in social work—and why meaningful understanding begins with recognizing the limits of our own knowledge.
What Does It Really Take to Keep Schools Safe?
What does it really take to keep schools safe? Reflecting on my graduate research and experience as a psychiatric social worker, I explore why school violence prevention requires more than lockdowns and discipline—and how multidisciplinary threat assessment, early intervention, and student connection contribute to safer school communities.
Why Foster Youth Deserve More Than a Deadline
What happens when foster care support ends before a young person is ready for independence? Drawing from my personal experience aging out of foster care and a 2017 conversation with Karen Bass, I explore California's AB 12 legislation, the challenges facing transition-age foster youth, and why lived experience must help shape social work policy and advocacy.
How Nonprofit Budgets Impact Social Workers and the Communities They Serve
How can nonprofit organizations pay social workers fairly while maintaining quality services? Drawing from a graduate social work budgeting exercise, I explore the ethical challenges of nonprofit funding, employee compensation, organizational sustainability, and the difficult decisions that influence care for vulnerable communities.
Gentrification, Homelessness, and the Fight for Community Identity
Behind Venice, California's beautiful canals, luxury homes, and artistic culture lies a complex story of gentrification, homelessness, and housing inequality. Reflecting on my 2017 community assessment, I explore how economic development can reshape neighborhoods, displace longtime residents, and challenge community identity—and why social work advocacy is essential to promoting social justice and belonging.
How Childhood, Adversity, and Resilience Shape Who We Become
How do childhood experiences, family separation, poverty, and discrimination shape who we become? Through a life history interview, I explore the connections between adversity, attachment, resilience, and identity—and reflect on what one woman's remarkable story taught me about human development and social work.
Can Cognitive Processing Therapy Help Youth Recover From Trauma?
How can evidence-based therapy help youth in foster care recover from trauma? Exploring Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), PTSD, and the potential of group treatment, this article examines the unique emotional, developmental, and systemic needs of foster youth and the importance of individualized, trauma-informed care.
From 'I' to 'We': Understanding the Stages of Consciousness Transformation
True recovery moves from "I" to "We." This post explores the Consciousness Transformation Model, discussing how shifting our focus from the ego to the collective can be the key to long-term mental health and spiritual growth.
From 'I' to 'We': How Nature Completed My View of Healing
As a social worker, I looked at families and communities to help clients heal. As a doctoral student, I realized I was missing the biggest system of all: nature. This post reflects on my evolution as a change-maker, from gardening with elementary students to overcoming imposter syndrome in my Ph.D. program.