Collaborative Agency Training for Parent Employees and Professionals in a New Agency Addressing Children's Mental Health
This paper describes an 8-week training curriculum conducted jointly with parent employees and professionals in a uniquely constructed agency. The agency provides case management and wraparound services for children with serious emotional disabilities (SED). Parents of children with SED helped conceptualize the agency, and parent employees play important roles in management and daily operations. Several experiences in developing this rural agency are portrayed and employee views are explored. The greatest focus is on aspects of the collaborative seminar for training employees in implementing the family strengths-based system of care in children's mental health. The curriculum is described, followed by lessons learned and implications for future parent–professional joint training.