Risking Connection®: A Training Curriculum for Working with
Survivors of Childhood Abuse
Description:
Risking Connection® is a theoretically sophisticated,
accessible treatment and response framework guided by a manual. Its helps providers develop optimally helpful
responses to trauma survivors through a comprehensive contextual foundation for
trauma informed services. The focus of
the program on the impact of the work on the helping professional, and from
teaching providers to understand and use their own reactions productively,
supports decreased levels of stress and burnout for providers.
Risking
Connection® for Working with Survivors of Childhood Abuse is used in
many states as workforce development for all levels of staff and providers of
care to persons who have survived trauma and in diverse settings and fields
including corrections, substance abuse, child residential and developmental
disabilities. This includes non-degreed
direct care workers as well as workers with advanced degrees, and front line
staff. Please note that Risking Connection®
is a core model which has contextual adaptations for different audiences (see
“Additional Contextual Adaptations”).
Modules in
the version for use for those providing clinical services—and time frames—may
be used flexibly and selectively.
Modules include:
¢
Understanding
Trauma is the First Step;
¢
Using
Connections to Develop Treatment Goals with Survivor Clients;
¢
Keeping
a Trauma Framework When Responding to Crises and Life-Threatening Behaviors;
¢
Working
with Dissociation and Staying Grounded:
Self-Awareness as a Tool for Clients and Helpers;
¢ Vicarious Traumatization
and Integration: Putting It All
Together.
This five module, 20-hour curriculum from Sidran
Institute is
guided by a manual and offers assessment, self-reflection, group discussion,
and clinical practice exercises, making it interactive and experiential. The manual also contains client and provider
worksheets. Modules used and time frame
are flexible.
Risking
Connection® was developed by the Sidran
Institute. Karen W. Saakvitne,
Ph.D. and Laurie Anne Pearlman and their colleagues at the Trauma Research, Education,
and Training Institute, Inc. (TREATI) wrote the text with input from an
editorial board consisting of other helping professionals and trauma survivors
with extensive experience in state mental health systems, clinical treatments
of traumatic stress conditions, curriculum design, and the law.
Additional
contexted adaptations. In collaboration with the
International Conference of War Veteran Ministers, Risking Connection®
has been adapted for use by leaders of faith communities who wish to acknowledge
the presence of and better relate to trauma survivors in their congregations
(see entry for Risking Connection® in Faith Communities). Other contextual adaptations in progress
focus on domestic violence settings, military families, and providers of primary
health care.
Status of Research: Unpublished
one-year post training survey of Risking Connection® users in New
York and Massachusetts completed in August 2002 reported high levels of
satisfaction with the increase in ability to help trauma survivors in a variety
of treatment settings. Over 90% of
respondents gave Risking Connection® training credit for “improving
my effectiveness as a treatment provider”, “empowered me to help clients
address symptoms and work toward more effective methods of coping”, and
“boosting my enthusiasm and levels of hope regarding working with trauma
survivors.”
Evaluation
for Risking Connection® use in a trauma-informed HIV prevention
project in partnership with the University of Maryland School of Psychiatry,
Center for School Mental Health Services, Maryland State Department of
Education, and Maryland State AIDS Administration has been completed.
Evaluation was highly positive for Risking Connection’s role in contextualizing
the childhood trauma antecedents to drug use, unsafe sex, and other risk-taking
behavior which may lead to HIV.
Evaluation has been designed and funded in partnership with
Research has
been designed, submitted, and is pending National Institutes of Health (NIH)
funding in partnership with
Evaluation
has been designed and proposal submitted to SAMHSA by the Klingberg
Family Centers, in
Contact
Information:
To learn
more, or to schedule a training event, contact:
Esther Giller at Sidran Institute
410-825-8888,
ext. 207
To read more about Risking Connection, or to order:
http://www.sidran.org/store/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&product_id=121