Download Mail-in Registration Form

SPEAKERS

Cindy Carlson, Ph.D.
Professor and Department Chair of the Department of Educational Psychology,
University of Texas at Austin
website 

Cindy Carlson, PhD is Professor and Chair of the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin. Previously she served as Director of the School Psychology Program. Dr. Carlson received her Ph.D. from Indiana University in 1982, completed an APA-accredited clinical psychology internship at the University of Tennessee College of Medicine in 1980-81, and is a licensed psychologist in the State of Texas.  

Dr. Carlson’s areas of teaching and research focus on the home-school partnership and family-centered treatment. She is Associate Editor of the Journal of Couple & Family Therapy: Research and Practice, an APA Fellow in School Psychology and Family Psychology, and past-president of Division 43 (Family Psychology) and Division 16 (School Psychology). Dr. Carlson’s current focus of scholarship is the role of psychology in integrated health care, including school-based clinical services, a function of her role as Project Director for a training award from Health Resources and Services Administration.

Sandra Christenson, Ph.D.
Professor of Educational Psychology and Birkmaier Professor of Educational Leadership,
University of Minnesota
website

Dr. Christenson is the Birkmaier Professor of Educational Leadership, Professor of Educational Psychology, and faculty member in the School Psychology Program at the University of Minnesota. Her research focuses on interventions that enhance engagement at school and with learning for marginalized students with and without disabilities.  She is particularly interested in the identification of contextual factors that facilitate student engagement and increase the probability for student success in school, and the identification of the effect of family-school partnership variables. She has been a principal investigator on several federally-funded projects in the areas of dropout prevention and family-school partnerships, including Check & Connect, which is in its 20^th year of research.  There are now four efficacy trials of Check & Connect occurring in large cities (Montreal, Chicago, San Diego, San Jose).  Most recently, the Check & Connect program has been adapted to prepare middle and high school students to be college ready as well as for use in community college settings.

Dr. Christenson publishes extensively; she has co-edited the Handbook of School-Family Partnerships and the Handbook of Research on Student Engagement. Dr. Christenson was the 1992 recipient of the Lightner Witmer Award from APA for scholarship and early career contributions to the field of school psychology, the 2005 recipient of the Blanche F. Ittleson Award from the American Orthopsychiatric Association for her pioneering work with families, and the 2007 recipient of the Senior Scientist Award from APA in recognition of her career-long significant program of scholarship.  

Michelle Karns
Educator, Speaker, Author, Karns Consulting
Davis, CA
website 

Michelle Karns committed to working with youth in the late sixties and has had an active and diverse career in pursuit of making a difference for children and their families. She has authored seven books about youth in school and has written extensively for parents. When she was asked to speak at the United Nations, she talked about the demand side of the drug abuse problems we confront. She weaves resiliency research into all that she does, and she perceives the asset paradigm as a key response to today's problems.

Parents Education Network
San Francisco, CA 
website

Founded in 2003, the Parents Education Network is a coalition of parents dedicated to working with schools, students, and communities to promote academic and developmental success for students with learning and attention difficulties.

PEN also runs a very popular event called Education Revolution (EdRev) at AT&T Park in San Fracisco each year. This year the event will be held on April 21, 2012, from 9am to 5pm.  Check out their website here: http://edrevsf.org. 

Who Should Attend This Conference?

School Psychologists, Counselors, Clinical Psychologists, Teachers, Social Workers, Administrators, Educational Therapists, Parents, Marriage and Family Therapists, Speech and Language Therapists, Occupational Therapists, Education and Psychology Students, and Other Health Professionals

Continuing Education Units (CEUs) and Certificates of Attendance
We will offer 6 hours of CEUs from the California Board of Behavioral Sciences (BBS) to those who attend both morning and afternoon sessions. You must sign in for both the morning and afternoon sessions to receive a CEU certificate.  Please note that no partial credits will be given.  We can not yet offer CEUs from APA or from NASP.  Attendees will be given a certificate of attendance at the end of the day.  

SESSION DESCRIPTIONS

Presenters will discuss research about and practical strategies for building and maintaining partnership relationships between schools and students’ families, with the ultimate goal of promoting students' academic and socio-emotional developmental success.  Discussion will address topics of diversity, and attention will be paid to the particular challenges and importance of building partnerships between schools and families of students with special needs.  

Individual Session Descriptions:

Dr. Christenson: "Strengthening the Family-School Relationship for Disengaged Learners: Critical Principles and Practices"

In this presentation, the empirical base for engaging with parents to foster positive academic, social, and emotional learning outcomes will be addressed. The substantial evidence for creating constructive family-school relationships around children’s learning informs the use of an intentional process at a school-wide level; this includes consideration of the approach, attitudes, atmosphere, and actions adopted. Findings and lessons learned from six applications of Check & Connect with students in general and special education and in grades K -12 and their families informs targeted strategies for engaging with parents who feel marginalized from the educational system. Partnership principles and effective practices for strengthening the family-school relationship will be described.  

Dr. Carlson: "Evidence-Based (and Promising) Family-Centered Interventions for Children"

This presentation will begin with statistics that highlight the challenges presented by children to school psychologists in our nation's schools; next the theoretical rationale for family-centered intervention as a solution will be provided; existing intervention models or programs with strong or promising evidence support will be described and limitations of the existing knowledge base noted. The presentation will end highlighting future trends that are expected to impact family-centered school-based interventions. 

Michelle Karns: "Choosing to be an Asset Based Practitioner"

Being in service to youth and their families is a complex task fraught with potential hazards that can become traps for the practitioner and the client.  All youth, family advocates, and clinical practitioners must understand that their personal mindset impacts the outcomes of their practice. Whether serving marginalized populations, language or cultural minorities, economically distressed or the seriously ill or disabled, the tenor of the approach and the quality of the relationships matters. This is an awesome responsibility. If students and their families are viewed as problems to be fixed, broken, and lacking resources or competence to do whatever is necessary to support their child, the results will reflect that bias.

This is one of the significant barriers to school centered services. Other difficulties are tied to the beliefs about the system, the lack of know how to provide realistic support, and the political climate.  A clinical reality, whatever you focus on will expand, forces the advocate and clinical staff to ensure that their efforts are supportive and target the behaviors and circumstances that can be changed prosocially.

Building upon strengths, assets, and personal capital allows for solution focused interventions that help students and their families construct a meaningful response to what needs to be done. Asset based strategies eliminate the shame and blame often associated with the deficit model and problem oriented efforts. It relies on a relationship not a relational connection. The most important point of leverage in the clinical relationship is the belief that change is possible and that the human is self-righting. It is also necessary to assign the best possible motivation for behavior to embrace those with needs. These can be woven together into a protective buffer using meaningful work, future focused goals, and caring nurturing adults as a means to bridge home school connections.   

Parents Education Network (PEN):

Building partnerships with families requires that school staff understand the perspectives of parents.  PEN will discuss the common experiences of parents who have children with attention and learning difficulties.  Though barriers to working with school staff will be addressed, the emphasis of this session is on what parents report as being successful in forging school-family partnerships.  Ample time will be allotted for questions and dialogue. 

TENTATIVE SCHEDULE

Confirmations & Receipts
Confirmations of registration are sent via email. If you have not received confirmation within five days of the program, please contact us at ucbschpsyc@gmail.com.  

See attendee list (Scroll to bottom of the link to event brite page.)

* (Must submit to ucbschpsyc@gmail.com: name and e-mail address of professor to verify enrollment. Students at all schools welcome.)

EVENT LOCATION INFORMATION

The Claremont Hotel
41 Tunnel Road, Berkeley, CA 94705
Phone: 800-551-7266

Directions: http://www.claremontresort.com/hotel_directions.shtml

Parking - Cash Only
Parking is $10 per day cash only self-park and about $19 for valet.

Public Transit
Visit transit.511.org and put in the address of 41 Tunnel Road, Berkeley, CA 94705 for directions from your location.  The conference center is accessible by public transit.  

CONFERENCE MAILING ADDRESS

UC Berkeley Graduate School of Education
School Psychology Program
4511 Tolman Hall
Berkeley, CA 94720-1670
510/642-4202 (email is preferred)
Attn: School Psychology Conference
ucbschpsyc@gmail.com

Be sure to also learn about the Parents Education Network Event:

Education Revolution 

Saturday, April 21, 2012, 9am-5pm at AT&T Park, San Francisco

For more information: http://edrevsf.org

The day features a newly redesigned technology section complete with demonstrations, an exhibit hall with over 100 exhibitors, workshops on a variety of topics, a keynote address by accomplished adults with learning and attention difficulties, and much more. The event is FREE for all students, teachers and school administrators. There is even  AT&T Park / SF Giants Field Activities like Running the Bases, Pop-fly Machine, Batting Tunnels, Fan Lot, Speed Pitch. Register now http://edrevsf.org.