My Professional Mission Statement to Bloomsburg University
As an advocate for humanity, I am diversity friendly. So, I accept everyone of all differences on an individual basis no matter who they are. It is important to spread awareness and show genuine compassion, acceptance, and inclusivity in order to be a true diversity advocate. What spreading awareness means to me is educating myself and others about all differences to celebrate diversity. What showing compassion means to me is putting oneself in the shoes of other people with diverse backgrounds, especially hardships. To elaborate, compassion means showing understanding of how another person feels, thinks, and why they exhibit certain actions when facing difficult situations and taking action to support them. What showing acceptance means to me is a balance between focusing on and beyond people's differences and realizing that their differences do not define them. Differences are only a part of everyone and there are plenty of other positive qualities about everyone.
I have my Associate's Degree in Early Childhood Education, a dual Bachelor's Degree in Early Childhood and Special Education along with Pennsylvania state certifications in Early Childhood Education PreK-4 and Special Education PreK-12. I also have my Nonviolent Crisis Intervention Third Edition Training certification through the Crisis Prevention Institute (CPI) and Child Development Associate (CDA) certification. I am in my ninth year of teaching and second year of Special Education. I have fourteen years of volunteer experience that involves supporting the disability community through alliances. I chose Bloomsburg University's Master's Degree Program in Clinical Mental Health Counseling to gain further insight regarding how to support students and other individuals with mental health challenges. The program being completely online is also beneficial for me as a full-time Special Education Teacher.
I have a desire to pursue professional aspirations and opportunities in community mental health. I commit to providing an equitable, inclusive, and safe environment for all clients, families, colleagues, and other people. An equitable, inclusive, and safe environment should go beyond integrated inclusion by providing everyone with a sense of belonging. It is crucial and ethically responsible that all mental health professionals presume competence in clients of all differences and set realistic expectations. All of this shows acceptance, value, and honor of who everyone is and what they bring to their community, which provides them with a safe place to be themselves, self-express honestly, and grow. It is crucial for mental health professionals to support a balance between a client's support system and independence. Besides doing tasks on one's own, independence is a life skill that includes self-help, self-motivation, and self-advocacy. It is important for mental health professionals to keep an open mind about anyone's abilities and challenges along with their potential hardships behind closed doors. This is because not everyone feels comfortable nor has access to a safe space to open up about trauma. This extremely important to keep in mind when it comes to intersectionality among marginalized populations and the systemic disparities and disproportionalities that they face. Furthermore, trauma survivors and people in the disability community do not have easy lives, which is why they deserve compassion. For that matter, my favorite motto is, "Everyone is going through something that no one knows anything about. So, always be kind."
There are many influential counseling factors that impact ethical conduct and building relationships between mental health counselors and their clients. It is essential for mental health counselors to build nonjudgmental relationships with clients that foster trust, empathy, motivation and deeper emotional insight and reduce client resistance. Mental health counselors can do all of this by acknowledging individual clients' inner strengths, readiness, and interests and incorporating them as motivators to work on themselves. Mental health counselors should provide behavior-specific praise regarding clients' personal motivation to change and positive outcomes. Mental health counselors' communication skills are another key influential factor for building relationships with clients. Mental health counselors should communicate information clearly with a positive attitude, persuade hope and positive beliefs that interventions will help, and actively listen to clients' dialogue. Consistently encouraging success is heavily reliant on these universal elements of the relationships between mental health counselors and their clients instead of only specialized methods.
I implement Trauma-Informed Care and Education (TICE), Social-Emotional Learning (SEL), Culturally-Responsive (CR), and psychoeducation practices in my field. I model self-regulation strategies by utilizing the "I do, we do, you do" method and providing written/picture visuals when necessary. This provides the client with clarity about how to handle situations when their mental health challenges may impede their daily living. I validate clients' feelings and diverse characteristics while also educating them about boundaries. Mental health counseling sessions should provide consistency and structure. The session should set clear limits on time, fees, session frequency, and expectations. It is also important for sessions to be completed in a quiet environment that fulfills the client's comfort level and legal privacy rights for them to feel safe and secure. I have a strong aptitude for success in online learning and professional skills to manage rigorous graduate work and heavy clinical loads. My readiness to handle online learning has been gained through prior experience towards my Associate's Degree as a part-time student while working as a full-time toddler teacher before and during the coronavirus pandemic. I also have experience managing caseloads as a Special Education Teacher in an Autism Support classroom. My philosophies and professional attitude will be a contributing asset as Bloomsburg University's Master's Degree program in Clinical Mental Health Counseling is dedicated to equity, inclusion, and goal setting.
Thank you so much for reading!
Did you enjoy and find this post helpful? You can support me and see more content like this by following me on Instagram and liking my Facebook page if you are not already by clicking on the hyperlinks below:
Instagram: @firstformerbuddyclubpresident (I would especially appreciate it if you followed my Instagram as I am trying to reach my goal of 1️⃣7️⃣0️⃣0️⃣ followers to grow the community🫶🏻🧠♿🧑🏿🦽🦾🦿🧩♾️🧑🏽🦯🐕🦺🦮❤️🧡💛💚🩵💜🩷💞)
Facebook: First Former Buddy Club President
Give feedback! Questions? Compliments? Suggestions? Let me know in the comments section below and/or email me at ehoffbuddyclub@gmail.com !
If you repost any of my content to your own page or story, please tag me and keep my logo visible. Thank you💕
Comments
Post a Comment