Carolyn Knight – författare

Group Work with Populations a Risk, Fourth Edition is a fundamental resource for practitioners in health and mental health settings and a comprehensive guidebook of group work skills. Geared toward students and professionals gaining a beginning understanding of groups, this volume describes how to work with vulnerable populations. The first chapters, new additions to this edition and written by a new co-editor, provide overarching skills and techniques thatapply across group work settings and populations. These skills, along with case examples, provide a template for practice with groups. The vulnerable populations that are addressed include returning war veterans, immigrants, the aging and their caregivers, children and adults who have been abused, and peoplestruggling with substance abuse issues, cancer, and chronic mental illness. New chapters have been added for survivors of sex trafficking, children in need of social skills training, people who experienced intimate partner violence, parents who are homeless, and fathers who are incarcerated. Each chapter (designed to stand alone for easy reference) describes the population and reviews the relevant literature, identifies themes and practice principles, presents case illustrations, providesevaluation guidance, and refers readers to key references and web resources.

A Handbook of Contemporary Group Work Practice is for both students and practitioners in social work, counselling, psychology, and all other helping professions. Whether readers are new to the modality or experienced group leaders, they can read a chapter and immediately appreciate the benefits group membership provides to the identified population and understand how to help group members achieve their collective goals. Many authors include case examples that provide readers with a window into how the group they describe functions in practice. Authors also include online resources that will help readers replicate the group in their practice setting. The handbook is organized into four sections. Part I provides readers with a straightforward introduction to group work practice, its foundation in mutual aid, and the core skills needed to promote members' collaborative efforts. This includes a discussion of what it means to adopt a trauma-informed lens in group work practice. In Parts II, III, and IV, contributors describe the groups they have facilitated. For ease of reading, authors adhere to a similar format that includes descriptions of the client population, rationale for and structure of the group, common themes, intervention skills and strategies, caveats, and termination and evaluation. Carolyn Knight and Geoffrey L. Greif distinguish three broad types of groups based upon the primary focus of members' collective efforts; in reality, many groups include elements one, two, or all three types. Parts II and III describe groups that promote resilience and growth in response to challenging life transitions and trauma exposure. Part IV includes groups that challenge systemic marginalization and inequality. The emphasis in all the groups is the importance of empowerment, at both the individual and community levels, respect for diversity, and an emphasis on inclusion and equity at the micro (group) and macro (systemic) levels.

Originally published in 1980, The Life Model of Social Work Practice was the first textbook to introduce the ecological perspective into social work practice. This fourth edition brings the text up to date by expanding and deepening this perspective. Integrating contemporary theory and research findings with numerous case illustrations drawn from a wide range of practice contexts, this textbook provides students with an invaluable introduction to the real world of social work practice and includes knowledge, methods, and skills for advanced practice.The authors detail the theoretical foundation of the ecological perspective and the life model’s emphasis on evidence- and ethics-guided practice, culturally competent and diversity-sensitive practice, and the multiple sources of accountability that social workers face. The text features an extensive discussion of the principles of trauma-informed practice and their implications for social work practice. Its discussion of cultural competence and sensitivity to diversity incorporates contemporary concepts such as cultural humility and privilege, intersectionality, and critical race theory and presents their application to practice. The authors integrate current research throughout the text and provide numerous research applications to underscore and model the importance of evidence-guided practice.The fourth edition reflects the National Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics and the Council on Social Work Education’s most recent set of competency standards, which accredit social work schools and programs. It is accompanied by a teachers guide that provides chapter summaries, recommended teaching methods and skills, questions for discussion, and suggested assignments and identifies where in the text the nine EPAS competencies and their associated practice behaviors are addressed.

Survivors of trauma are disproportionately represented in agencies providing a broad range of behavioral, social, and mental health services. Practitioners in these settings must understand and be able to respond to survivors of trauma in ways that are empowering, normalize and validate their experiences and reactions, and minimize the risk of retraumatization. Practitioners also will be indirectly traumatized as a result of their work with trauma survivors.Practitioners’ ability to help clients with histories of trauma depends upon clinical supervision that is trauma-informed. The trauma-informed supervisor has the dual responsibility of enhancing supervisees’ skills as trauma-informed practitioners and helping them manage the impact their work has on them.Nevertheless, many clinical supervisors only have limited knowledge and training in trauma and may not recognize either the needs of those whom they supervise or the clients their supervisees serve. This book compiles important recommendations from trauma-informed practitioners, supervisors, and researchers who share their professional reflections and personal stories based on their hands-on experiences across mental health and medical contexts.This book was originally published as a special issue of The Clinical Supervisor.