Exploring Diverse Perspectives and Experiences in Human Services

Respond to at least three of your classmates’ posts. Each of your responses to your classmates should be at least 150 words in length, and include an APA formatted scholarly resource. In your response post, please provide a thoughtful reply to promote discussion, critical thinking, and class interaction, and provide an open-ended question for each of your colleagues.

DISCUSSION 1 (Kayla) My name is Kayla, I am a 40 year-old mother of 3. I have a 7th grade daughter, a son that is a sophomore in college, and a son that is a freshman in college. Needless to say, they keep me on my toes and busy! I live in a small town in East Texas, about halfway between Houston and Dallas. I obtained my bachelor’s degree in early childhood education from Ashford University in 2017. I always thought I wanted to be a teacher and I was for about 10 years. I was laid off by my prior school and was awarded the opportunity to work in the mental health field and truly found my calling here. I am a case manager for The Heart of Texas Behavioral Health Network. I have held this position for almost three years now. This is my LAST CLASS prior to obtaining my master’s degree in human services and the ability to advance in my current company. The light at the end of the tunnel is finally visible! On my free time (whatever free time is ) I enjoy going for walks, exercising, reading, fishing, shopping, and hanging out with my family. We love to camp, and have our next trip planned for May!

• What you are most excited to learn in this course? I am excited to learn even more about the field of human services and what challenges mental health services will face in the future.

• What you feel might challenge you the most in this course? I believe that my biggest challenge will be putting my thoughts into a research proposal, and finding the evidence needed to support my research.

• Refer to the Week 6 Assignment description under the Week 6 Module. o What three (3) courses in your program of study you feel will help

you with the completion of your Research Proposal Project assignment due on Day 7 of Week 6? I think that research designs and methods, human service administration, and overview of human services would have been the three most beneficial courses to help me with this final course and my research proposal.

• What one resource from any prior course in the MA Human Services curriculum that you have taken might assist you and your peers in completing Research Proposal Project assignment? I believe that our library is filled with

valuable information, and there are always articles that will assist in anything you are looking to find.

I look forward to meeting everyone and gaining more knowledge from you all! Best of luck to everyone!

Respond to at least three of your classmates’ posts. Each of your responses to your classmates should be at least 150 words in length, and include an APA formatted scholarly resource. In your response post, please provide a thoughtful reply to promote discussion, critical thinking, and class interaction, and provide an open-ended question for each of your colleagues.

DISCUSSION 2 (Rebecca) My name is Rebecca. I am 48 years old and live in a very small town with a population of 3232 in Texas called Llano. I am working on my 5th degree in the human service field and have a history of 20+ years working in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) as a Chemical Dependency Counselor or LCDC. The day before I retired, I lost my husband of 22 years and returned to my hometown of Llano within a week. Since that time, I remarried, became a grandmother to 6, a stepmother to 2 and a foster mother to 1 who we in the process of adopting. The total children in my life include 3 girls ages 29, 14 and 9, 2 boys aged 25 and 21. My daughter has 3 children, and my stepson has 3 children. My son who is 25 is on the Autism Spectrum, and lives at home with me, my stepdaughter, and her little sister also have special needs had have been severely abused by their bio mother. In September I took a leave of absence from college to travel to Idaho to pick up my stepdaughter and her little sister for permanent placement awarded to me and my husband. We have fought for two years to have them both be placed in our custody.

I currently in my spare time work for the church and teach Sunday school to 5 children with special needs. When not working my 16 hour a day job that I am at 6 days a week, I attend college, play video games with my husband, cook, clean and shop and work on diamond art paintings. Life is good down time is even better when I get to spend time with my dad, go to church, and edit his photos for his side job and play with my puppy named “La Bearro” or mop for short.

The Non-profit I currently work for is called Bluebonnet trails community service; I am part of the TCCOOMI team which is a division of the criminal justice program. Bluebonnet Trails is an LMHA and covers 8 counties in Texas. Current research shows that more individuals that return home from prison need extra help and counseling to return to the normal way of life and can maintain freedom rather than reoffending. I am one of the luckiest people that is able to work independently and make my own schedule to meet the needs of the clients and court systems.

This is the last class I have to finish my degree. I have not decided yet if I am going to work on another master program yet or not. If I do I am leaning towards Criminal Justice because mental illness is one of the key factors of people committing crimes.

What you are most excited to learn in this course? I am looking forward to learning more about how to develop a research proposal.

What you feel might challenge you most in this course? My biggest problems in all courses is pinpointing a topic for proposal.

What three courses in your program of study you feel will help you with the completion of your Research Proposal Project assignment? The library is my most valuable tool. However, the courses that have helped me the most for my current career are the psychology classes. I do not want to become a grant writer. I do, however, have a passion to help people and want to further my career by helping more people with different areas of their lives.

Respond to at least three of your classmates’ posts. Each of your responses to your classmates should be at least 150 words in length, and include an APA formatted scholarly resource. In your response post, please provide a thoughtful reply to promote discussion, critical thinking, and class interaction, and provide an open-ended question for each of your colleagues.

DISCUSSION 3 (Stephanie) Hello, my name is Stephanie, a sixty-four-year-old grandmother of twenty- grands and two great-grands. I was born and raised in Macon, Georgia, and moved to Brooklyn, New York after graduation in 1977. My 40-plus tenure in New York was very inspiring and rewarding diverting with the different cultures and their ethic ways with a rapid pace of behaviors while working in various medical fields. Residing back in Georgia the culture shock is also populated with the same diversity of people but on a slower scale.

Also, the mother of seven children six are living and one is deceased. Due to my daughter’s death in 2007, I raised her child my grandson, a sophomore at Georgia State University dual major (Associate) Dental Hygienist (Bachelor) Journalism and broadcast with a minor in vast communications upon graduation. I am an Alumni of Ashford University where I received my Bachelor of Arts in Applied Behavioral Science in April of 2017. Before obtaining my Bachelor, I graduated from Bryant & Stratton College Albany New York Campus with an Associate of Applied Science Medical Administrative Assistant in June of 2014.

I have a thriving event and party planning business that started on a whelm several years back when trying to organize birthday parties and events for my grandkids and family. When I am not putting colorful linens on tables and chairs and making balloon

props and whimsical centerpieces, I am exploring the world of various videos on YouTube for more inspiring ideas for keeping my customers happy.

The Non-profit I am afflicted with is MAC an educational enrichment organization operated with a driven purpose of bringing at-risk youths and their families together, experiencing a common belief, and having the ability to understand and encourage solidarity through knowledge, skills, education, peer connection, sponsorship and associations to services that are based on the community needs to fosters and promote learning and growth, through mentorships related counseling support services and programming throughout our count of Bibb(MAC., n.d.).

In this course, I am excited to learn it all because now we are after a journey that started several years ago. Refreshing and adding more knowledge to what we have learned will seal the deal opening yet another door to a bigger and brighter future. My challenge will not be the course per se but time management, I sometimes find myself being a procrastinator waiting until the last minute to get things done. Even though I have enjoyed all of my courses the three I most feel that will help me with the completion of my Research Proposal Project assignment are HUM5010: Overview of Human Services, HUM6100: Group Theories & Human Systems, and ORG6520: Professional Ethics Standards of Practice & Law. The resource that has been beneficial for me in helping with my courses is the Writing Center & Library.

I am looking forward to communicating with you in the discussion segment.