Rapid Assessment Procedures

SUMMARY

Given the racialization of subjective, material and historical realities in South Africa, psychological training and practice in community raise crucial and often thorny ethical, epistemological and methodological questions. This article appraises the strengths and limitations of using Rapid Assessment Procedures (RAP) (Afonja, 1992) in the field training of postgraduate students in community-counseling psychology. Rooted in an activist participatory action research framework (Lykes, 1997), RAP provide a framework for the collective exploration of locally constructed representations of a community's needs and resources; joining the ‘community’ (negotiating a dialogical form of communication and a respect for the insider-outsider dialectic); working through one's ‘situated otherness’; and deracializing psychological training and practice.     

The Pinjarra Massacre Site Project

SUMMARY

The work described in this article came about as a result of the author's doctoral studies. What began as a program of action research developed into concrete social action dealing with issues of social justice and reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous groups in a town in Australia's Southwest. The strong collaborative partnerships that developed during the research process led to employment on a project concerned with promoting the recognition of a massacre of local Indigenous people in the early days of European invasion. While a community psychologist was not necessarily the obvious person for the job, the article demonstrates how key principles of community psychology guided the project, and were in fact vital for its success.     

Learning Science for Social Good

SUMMARY

This conceptual case study explores two dynamic tensions, substantive and pedagogical, fundamental to teaching research in community psychology from a service learning perspective. The substantive dynamic tension is seen in traditional versus adventuresome approaches to community research; the pedagogical dynamic tension occurs in classroom instruction versus field work. To address the substantive tension, students were introduced to the epistemology and methods of adventuresome community research and then used both adventuresome and traditional elements in conducting a community research project. To address the pedagogical tension, class and field sessions were used to complement one another for student preparation, action, and reflection. Four guidelines for designing community research courses from a service learning perspective are articulated.     

Breaking Fresh Ground

ABSTRACT

In the present paper, the author introduces her roles and duties at her current job. The author then describes how she got into community psychology and primary prevention and how her graduate school and previous work experiences have influenced her current work. Focusing on primary prevention, the author delineates how the two community psychology concepts -primary prevention and action research -can be applied to the promotion of adolescent mental health in the Korean society. The author then adds advice for foreign students who are considering studying community psychology in the U.S.     

Parenting education: Primary prevention in a rural community

SUMMARY

The present paper describes the educational background and current role of a community psychologist conducting tobacco control studies at a research institute affiliated with a university medical school. This includes how the author originally became interested in community psychology as an undergraduate, chose a graduate training program and postdoctoral fellowship, and how this training was instrumental in obtaining the current position.     

A Principle-Based Psychology of School Violence Prevention

Abstract

This paper proposes that school violence is primarily a function of the typically poor mental health of at-risk students. It asserts therefore, that the most leveraged solution to this vexing problem is for school personnel to teach these students how to re-kindle and experience their birthright of optimal psychological functioning. It suggests that this goal can best be achieved by helping both teachers and students understand a unique principle-based psychology that purports to account for all youthful perception, feelings and behavior. The three principles of this psychology (i.e., Mind, Consciousness, and Thought) are defined, classroom conditions conducive to teaching youth these principles delineated, contemporary research supporting the major assumptions of this paradigm summarized, and the results of school violence prevention programs based on this psychology presented.     

Social and Environmental Predictors of Adjustment in Homeless Children

SUMMARY

Both the field of community psychology and the disability rights movement, including the field of disability studies, have been growing over the last 30 years. While common values, principles, and strategies have emerged within these two fields, they have often emerged independently and in ignorance of each other. Recognition of the value of community psychology perspectives on disabilities and community action is the motivation both for this special volume and for the disability interest group of the Society for Community Research and Action. In this article, we examine the action steps different authors have identified as important in responding effectively to community needs. We identify a general model and three settings which require an adaptation of this general model. These settings differ in the extent to which the recipients (consumers, people with disabilities) are already established as a community, and the extent to which providers (agencies, government) have established relationships with that community. We offer concluding comments regarding collaboration and knowledge sharing between the field of disability studies and community psychology.     

Design and Implementation of Parent Programs for a Community-Wide Adolescent Alcohol Use Prevention Program

SUMMARY

Project Northland is a comprehensive community trial designed to evaluate programs for the primary prevention of alcohol-related problems during adolescence. It uses a community-wide model, that includes both demand and supply reduction techniques. The first phase of Project Northland (grades 6-8) was completed with the effective implementation of multiple, complementary programs including a multi-year social behavioral curriculum, intensive parental involvement components, peer leadership opportunities, and community-level changes through the formation of local task forces. This article describes the process used for developing and implementing the comprehensive parent interventions used during the first phase of the research, highlighting the elements that led to the successful implementation of the programs with very high participation rates by parents, their young adolescents, teachers, and community members.     

Education and Employment in Rural Alaska

SUMMARY

The history of my work experience in rural Alaska suggests the value of combining academic and field experience in community psychology with employment in graduate school. Twelve years of employment in rural Alaska leading to my present position with a rural Alaska Native Health organization is briefly reviewed. It is concluded that graduate students should examine, carefully and openly, their choices in preparing a path for applied community psychology employment.     

School Violence Interventions in the Safe Schools/Healthy Students Initiative

Abstract

The Safe Schools/Healthy Students Initiative was designed to encourage collaboration among school districts and local community service providers in the provision of behavioral health prevention and early intervention efforts. These efforts would address the physical safety of students as well as provide mental health, violence prevention, and social skills services. One local SS/HS Initiative brought together community and school collaborators in an ambitious agenda that included 14 distinct programs that addressed the needs of over 110,000 students in a large school district. The purpose of the current paper is to report the results of the evaluation of two of the programs designed to reduce violent and disruptive behavior in schools. The programs include a school-based anger management program and a community-based, alternative-to-suspension program. Working in cooperation with program staff and the school district, quasi-experimental designs were used to measure change over time for students. The two studies demonstrate the application of multiple methodologies in evaluating the effectiveness of prevention and early intervention efforts with the aim of providing data to support program improvement and sustainability.     

The inner “I”

SUMMARY

Many community psychologists have the educational and professional backgrounds which make them potentially valuable resources for the disabilities field. The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) and the reauthorized Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) call for greater community inclusion, empowerment, and self-determination for persons with disabilities. Community psychologists with interests in these concepts, as well as in interdisciplinary training, collaboration, community-driven research, and political action are needed as leaders in the disabilities field. This paper explores the development of one community psychologist's career working with persons who have disabilities and the institutions that support them.     

Experiencing Community Psychology Through Community-Based Learning Class Projects: Reflections From an American University in the Middle East

Many introductory community psychology courses do not incorporate community-based learning (CBL), and when they do, it is most often in the form of individualized volunteer hours. We present an alternative model for CBL in which the entire class collaborates on an experiential project that promotes community action. We believe that such an approach better embodies the values and methods of the discipline and has a more powerful impact on the students and stakeholders. It may be especially effective in developing countries that do not have an established network of service infrastructures; in such nations the onus is on the teachers and learners of community psychology to contribute to transformative change. In this article practical guidelines are provided by the instructor regarding how to structure and implement this CBL model. Additionally, two students describe how the CBL experience solidified their learning of course concepts and significantly impacted them personally.     

Consumers as Collaborators in Research and Action

SUMMARY

This paper discusses the role of consumers as collaborators in disability research conducted in the community. A comprehensive model of participatory action research is described and illustrated with research and training projects conducted in a collaborative arrangement between researchers and a Consumer Empowered Team. The paper describes how adherence to the model could be conducted in actual research and training settings and produce outcomes valued by the consumers at whom the interventions were targeted. The advantages and caveats to using the consumer as collaborator approach are discussed.     

Becoming better health care providers: outcomes of a primary care service-learning project in medical school

Medical educators have begun to embrace service-learning as a method for teaching medical students to be more socially responsible, patient-oriented practitioners. However, research documenting the learning outcomes of service-learning in medical education is limited. In this paper, written documents generated through evaluation of a mandatory, structured community service-learning experience were analyzed qualitatively to discover the diverse learning outcomes among 24 students who participated in the experience. Preliminary findings indicate that students developed skills and attitudes directly related to competencies of concern in most U.S. medical programs. These preliminary findings may help other programs articulate learning outcomes for their service-learning programs. Further, these preliminary findings may stimulate more systematic research (qualitative and quantitative) in this area.     

Advocacy for prevention: The role of the mental health association in Michigan

SUMMARY

This paper describes the application of such community psychology principles of empowerment and systemic interventions in a variety of applied settings, including school systems, a university campus, and a community hospital. The consistent application of such principles illustrates one way in which a viable career as community psychologist can be maintained in settings that do not have community psychology positions per se.     

Interdisciplinary Programs in Community and Applied Research

SUMMARY

This article describes the critical role of interdisciplinary programs in addressing the mission of the Society for Community Research and Action. In the past decade, interdisciplinary approaches to graduate education have increased in importance yet the makeup of the Society does not reflect this change. The mission, organization, and curriculum focus of five programs are described. They include human development and family studies, social welfare, law/psychology, and community-social psychology. Prevention research and program evaluation are highlighted as key areas for program development.     

A Research Revolution in Women's Health

SUMMARY

Women's health research initiatives are emerging with evidence that there are unique diagnosis and intervention factors that provide a window into the specific health needs of women. The evidence of the need for this gender-specific research is being spurred by the establishment of The Office of Research on Women's Health by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). A review of some of the more current and salient research findings that apply to women's health and the health needs of women in different lifestyles, at different stages of the life cycle is discussed. Also considered are women's roles in the health service delivery system and where they fit into the provision of services within the context of women's styles of accessing and using health care. Self-help and other support programs will be described as they apply specifically to women and a case will be made for providing comprehensive, multi-systemic women's health services in one facility at the community level through an overview of some of the more current and successful models.