Celebrating 40 years of Research, Training, and Policy Development
1969-2009
Current Projects
Bronx Emergency Preparedness Coalition
Funder
Subcontractor to Jacobi Hospital with funds from New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene
Description
Since March 2006, the Workplace Center has been supporting the development of a social work disaster response plan for the Bronx Emergency Preparedness Coalition through research, program development, organizational analysis/change and training efforts. The Bronx Emergency Preparedness Coalition’s (BEPC) Social Work Disaster Response Team (SWDRT) is a coalition of 13 facilities across Bronx County that has agreed, through Memoranda of Understanding, to provide mutual aid to each other in the event of a disaster. These include municipal, voluntary, state and federal facilities that offer both acute and long-term care. The Workplace Center has facilitated the development of:
- Policies and procedures that define and support healthcare social workers’ and other providers’ roles in a disaster event, their activation, and plans for their deployment.
- A competency-based education and training program in disaster response for social work department staff to understand social work role in a disaster, understand and respond to secondary trauma and provide psychological first aid.
- Family Support Center Guidelines to plan and respond to the non-medical needs of individuals, families and community members affected by the presenting disaster. These guidelines include the planning, activation and recovery activities associated with the social work departments’ responses.
The outcome is to increase countywide capacity in psychosocial and mental health disaster response, and coordination among the BEPC healthcare facilities through social work departments.
Career Development and Employment Support for Youth Served by the Child Welfare System
Funder
Casey Foundation
Description
The Workplace Center is working with the Administration for Children Services (ACS) to meet the challenges of the times and ensure the well-being of youth in foster care by shifting organizational culture to embrace employment outcomes and enhance the capacity of the child welfare system to act on the opportunities that will lead to successful connections to employment for the youth served through ACS.
MTA
Funder
Metropolitan Transit Authority
Description
In this safety sensitive work environment, the Workplace Center, by contract with the MTA, conducts quarterly audits of the Union Assistance Program (UAP) of the Transit Workers Union Local 100 and of the MTA’s Employee Assistance Program (EAP) Cases and outreach activity of the UAP and the EAP are documented quarterly and annual reports identifying trends through comparative analysis are prepared, and quality assurance of service decisions and procedures is provided.
Peer Providers in Social Service Agencies: Creating Work Settings for Mutual Support
Funder
The Jacob and Valeria Langeloth Foundation
Description
This project is an expansion on prior work funded by the New York Community Trust (see Past Projects). It promotes the recovery of peer providers and the individuals they serve and preserves the employment opportunity that the peer provider position offers to people with mental health conditions by implementing and assessing the impact of workplace strategies designed to support recovery and integration. Six agencies in New York City offer sites for providing training, consultation and implementation of strategies appropriate to the special conditions of each agency. The experience is fully documented in a qualitative and quantitative analysis so that it can serve as the basis for a manualized process for the integration of peers and a controlled experiment of this best practice process.
Social Worker’s Willingness to Report to Work in a Disaster
New York Social Worker Disaster Survey
Funder
Subcontractor to The National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health
Description
This project assists the NCDP with a CDC funded project to assess social workers’ willingness to work in the event of a disaster response during an influenza pandemic. Social Workers across New York State are participating in this survey.
Start-Up NY2 Entrepreneurship Demonstration Project
Funder
Subcontractor to Burton Black Institute & Onondaga County Start-Up NY
Description
The Workplace Center will test the feasibility of and conditions under which the Start–Up NY Entrepreneurship Demonstration Project is replicable in the borough of Manhattan, New York City. The demo project will:
- Identify a group of stakeholders potentially interested in self employment for persons with disabilities (e.g., financial institutions, provider organizations, entrepreneurial assistance programs, vocational rehabilitation services, small business development centers)
- Solicit stakeholder participation in a group meeting which will: 1) share information about the Start-Up NY model; and
2) encourage self employment for persons with disabilities - Based on stakeholder feedback, assess the feasibility of replicating Start-Up NY in the Manhattan community and the implications for policy and practice
The goal of the Start-Up NY initiative is to foster entrepreneurial activity among people with disabilities.
Translating Evidence Based Practice into PROS
Funder
New York State Office of Mental Health
Description
The Workplace Center has been involved with the State Office of Mental Health and numerous providers throughout the State in seeking to identify the factors that promote or hinder integration of evidence based employment practices into provision of service through the new Medicaid-funded Personal Recovery Oriented Services (PROS) Program. The Center provides consultation and technical assistance to mental health care providers to support the implementation of employment-related services in PROS. Manuals and training curricula have been developed and training and consultation is offered in several counties across New York State.
Workplace Supports for Parents Who are Caregivers to Children with Asthma
Funder
National Institute of Health
Description
This grant from the National Institute of Health provides an opportunity for the Center to explore the feasibility and impact of workplace support on balancing the conflicting demands that arise when working single parents simultaneously try to maintain employment and care for children with asthma. The study is developing an innovative approach that offers effective workplace supports to caregivers to help them balance work and care giving. Specific aims of the two-year study include:
- Understanding the specific conflict involved with providing adequate care to a child with asthma while meeting work expectations and identifying the appropriate workplace supports that single parents perceive will help them to balance the demands of work and care giving roles.
- Developing an intervention, a plan for its implementation and a system for measuring its impact on working parents’ abilities to balance conflicts posed by trying to meet work expectations and their children’s health needs.
- Assessing the intervention impact and feasibility through a pilot test with working single parents of children with asthma.
The study targets an underserved population who disproportionately experience the negative challenges of caring for a child with asthma.
Miscellaneous Projects and Contracts
The Center carries out various short term contracts with organizations seeking training and consultation for program and policy development.
