Assignment task: In the previous Module Emergency Management Response Team Assignment: This team would require interdisciplinary community outreach.
Choose post and respond as the Consultant.
Original Questions:
1. Decide on what type of Community Outreach team would be a good fit for your interagency design.
2. Summarize the responsibilities of the counselor (in general, not about your agency), including the professional role, functions, and relationships as a member of a crisis response team during a local, regional, or national crisis, disaster, or other trauma-causing events.
Describe in detail the specific skills and knowledge required by a counselor to function effectively as a member of an interdisciplinary emergency management response team.
3. Describe the types of training a counselor requires, to develop the required skills and knowledge relevant to emergency management.
Develop a well-written post and determine specific roles for YOUR supervisees (counselors). Discuss the counselors' roles and responsibilities required to be a member of YOUR agency's Emergency Management response team and what that would look like. What other agencies would be involved?
4. Explore the information you did not know, to complete this assignment fully. Process what questions or direction (minimum 3) you would need in order to fully develop this service (meaning if you could ask an expert about developing this community outreach in your agency, what needs would you seek help in addressing).
Using the Content Instruction, including content-related videos, and readings, you will be developing strategies to help with program or staff development. Some repetitive articles are included for reference.
- Which Post (a quick summary of the need)
- State which of Caplan's Consultation models (only use one of the 4 Caplan models) you would use to address the issue
- Explain why you choose this model
- Provide 4-6 strategies, including your rationale.
POST: Emergency Management
Role and Responsibilities of the Counselor:
The professional role of the counselor as a crisis team member is to calmly and effectively address the needs of clients and other community members during a disaster or crisis and contribute extra support in a variety of ways. Even if counselors are not employed by the Crisis Counseling Assistance and Training Program (CCP), counselors should still model the behavior of those recruited as crisis counselors serving residents through community-based outreach (Bellamy, Wang, McGee, Liu, & Robinson, 2019, p. 20). The counselor's functions are not limited to assessing the mental health needs of clients in crisis and connecting them to community resources (including behavioral health professionals) to improve their well-being. CCP services are "strengths-based, outreach-oriented, more practical than psychological in nature, anonymous, conducted in nontraditional settings, culturally aware, designed to strengthen existing community support systems, and provided in ways that promote a consistent program identity" (Federal Emergency Management Agency, 2023, p. 10-11). The CCP funds the more intense primary services of "individual crisis counseling, basic supportive or educational contact, group crisis counseling, public education, community networking and support" and less intense secondary services including the "development and distribution of educational materials, and media and public service announcements" (FEMA, 2023, p.4).
One responsibility of emergency response team members would be to provide individual crisis counseling to help "disaster survivors understand their reactions, review their options, and connect with other individuals and agencies" for further practical assistance (FEMA, 2023, p. 4). The function of individual crisis counseling is to provide "reassurance, psycho-education, and emotional support" in addition to teaching behavioral coping skills (FEMA, 2023, p. 4-5). Crisis counselors provide groups or individuals with brief educational information and emotional support which requires active listening and knowledge of disaster-related resources and services (FEMA, 2023, p. 5). For more in-depth services, group crisis counseling services would be delivered by trained professionals in a psycho-educational or supportive manner to teach coping skills and appropriately refer services (FEMA, 2023, p. 5). Self-help groups may be initiated by a group crisis counselor, but if the counselor's goal is group autonomy, the counselor can invite a group member to co-facilitate (and eventually lead) the group (FEMA, 2023, p. 5).
Crisis counselors can be unlicensed but need to "have a demonstrated communication skillset that includes the ability to engage others, establish rapport, be calming and reflective, and validate feelings" (Bellamy et al., 2019, p. 20). Crisis counselors may take on the role of "team leader, supervisor, or clinical consultant for program referrals for those in need of intensive mental health services or substance abuse treatment" (Bellamy et al., 2019, p. 20). As a member of a crisis response team during a regional disaster, it would be the counselor's role to act as a liaison between community agencies and community members in the short- and long-term. The crisis response team counselor would use evidence-based practice and act preventatively (Bellamy et al., 2019, p. 20). This could mean crisis team members volunteer to educate the public about potential crises in an area or help individuals and families create preparedness plans for such events.
Types of Training Required of the Counselor:
The types of training a counselor required to develop the required skills relevant to emergency management by the Immediate Services Program (ISP) and Regular Services Program (RSP) include core content training, transition to RSP training, RSP midprogram training, disaster anniversary training, and RSP phasedown training (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 2024, para. 4). Core content training teaches administrative and community outreach strategies (FEMA, 2023, p. 17). Transition to RSP training addresses "how the needs of disaster survivors and communities evolve in the RSP and differ from those encountered in the immediate disaster response (FEMA, 2023, p. 18). RSP midprogram training, on the other hand, focuses on building staff morale and managing stress so that counselors can continue to practice (FEMA, 2023, p. 18). Disaster anniversary training helps counselors navigate anniversary reactions to the disaster event (FEMA, 2023, p. 18). Finally, RSP phasedown training emphasizes a counselor's future planning skills and continuity of service (FEMA, 2023, p. 18). In addition, "crisis counselors receive trainings in assessing an individual's or family's need for referral to additional disaster relief services or mental health or substance use treatment" (FEMA, 2023, p. 5). Other required trainings "teach crisis counselors about individual and community reactions to disaster, prepare them to deliver crisis counseling services, inform them about CCP procedures and data collection, and provide ... techniques to manage their own stress" (FEMA, 2023, p. 14).
Skills-based training includes psychological first aid (PFA) which is "used to assist people in reducing initial distress, building resilience, and [fostering] short-term adaptive functioning (Jacobs, Gray, Erickson, Gonzalez, & Quevillion, 2016, as cited in Bellamy et al., 2019, p. 20). Skills for the psychological recovery program (SPR) training include skills such as "problem-solving, positive activity scheduling, managing reactions, helpful thinking, and building healthy social connections" (Berkowitz et al., as cited in Bellamy et al., 2019, p. 21).
My Agency's Emergency Management Design
My Integrated Agency
My agency is a rural residential inpatient facility for women with substance use disorders and other mental health disorders. The staff for this residential facility are paid through a private practice clinical mental health agency. Envisioning mental health and medical health working together in this small facility means that instead of having clients schedule transport to medical appointments, a nurse would travel to the facility and provide routine check-ups. Each new client in the house would be seen on the same day bi-monthly. The facility would have a computer with HIPPA-compliant software to be used when the nurse or client needs to confer virtually with a doctor. The computer would also be necessary for clients to meet with their prescribers monthly in the ongoing medication management process. The residential facility would begin by housing a maximum of ten clients. We would employ two licensed therapists for individual and group therapy, and two licensed social workers for case management. The remaining employees would be peer support specialists, two of whom would have to be on the premises during daylight hours; they would take turns leading groups throughout the day. Parenting skills classes would also be optional and could be offered virtually to clients planning to reunite with their children.
The type of community outreach team that would fit my interagency design would be volunteer-oriented. Counselors and social workers at my agency would become involved in preventative care, primarily through education and planning, to ensure residents could survive a natural disaster. In the case of a regional crisis, the responsibilities of the counselor would still include assessment and referral, but they would also include individual and group counseling to members of the community. Counselors would be expected to provide counseling services outside of the facility to help "restore or improve functioning" and "[validate] common reactions and experiences" (FEMA, 2023, p. 15). My emergency response team would also engage in clean-up efforts, organizing charity drives and donations, or fundraising for local agencies. Other areas of the public sector that may be involved in these restorative efforts would be the American Red Cross, local churches, food distribution centers, and local fire or police departments.
Role and Responsibilities of the Counselor
To be a member of my agency's emergency management response team, counselors will embody certain roles, each with specific responsibilities. For instance, they may need to retain their counselor role while adjusting their approach to become more strengths-based and focus on resilience. This would look like, among other things, "[addressing the] cultural and safety issues in outreach" (Bellamy et al., 2019, p. 26). Other agencies would be involved in volunteer outreach services including hospitals, child protective services, nursing homes, law enforcement agencies, churches, homeless shelters, local health clinics, and other residential facilities.
Public education is an effective way for counselors to relay coping skills and resource information to disaster survivors. "Public speaking at community forums, professional inservice meetings, and local government meetings" are common ways to deliver information through public education (FEMA, 2023, p. 5). Crisis counselors offer networking and support services to connect survivors with resource organizations, faith-based agencies, or other local groups that could help meet survivors' needs as well as assist in long-term recovery through groups or gatherings (FEMA, 2023, p. 6). Again, members of my emergency team would distribute educational materials to provide information about potential disasters, common reactions to disasters, how to cope, and how individuals and their communities can foster resilience during times of crisis (FEMA, 2023, p. 6).
Considerations:
Admittedly, there were several pieces of information missing from my ability to fully complete this assignment. Do crisis counselors get paid or do they offer their services free of charge? I read that a state "may only be reimbursed for allowable costs incurred during the period of performance" (FEMA, 2023, p. 25) but I do not know what that means. The ISP grant stipulates the period of performance can last up to 60 days, but the RSP period of performance can last up to 8 months (FEMA, 2023, p. 25-26). Also, to fully develop community outreach services for my agency, I would need to seek help in addressing the needs of my community. I have questions about how to assess the risks and needs of residents, but perhaps if I went through the CCP trainings I would not have any questions about how to conduct a needs assessment. I am also curious if there is a way to assess the needs of individuals in the community preventatively as this may alleviate the severity of some individual's needs in times of crisis. As counselors, we touch on this during the intake process, and I wonder if "needs" are defined as internal, external, or both.
Finally, I may need to hire someone to apply for grants to fund crisis management services. I currently live in Kentucky but am moving and applying for provisional licensure in North Carolina so I am unsure how to pinpoint strategies. As I currently see it, the outreach services in my integrated facility are volunteer-based and centered around what I know about my extremely rural area of Kentucky. I am not sure how extensive our outreach services would be if I was not paying myself or other employees to do provide these services. Sometimes simply being a responsible member of the community may be enough incentive for some people to extend their time and energy to support others in their community, but I also know that many people have other more pressing priorities than volunteer work. During a crisis, I would assume that more affluent people would have the time and resources to volunteer, but where I live and work there are very few affluent people. I cannot imagine how to provide incentives for volunteer-based outreach work except to require it minimally (similar to requiring CE hours for maintaining licensure).
References:
Bellamy, N. D., Wang, M. Q., McGee, L. A., Liu, S. J., & Robinson, M. E. (2019). Crisis-counselor perceptions of job training, stress, and satisfaction during disaster recovery. Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 11(1), 19-27.
Federal Emergency Management Agency. (2023, April). Crisis counseling assistance and training program guidance. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2024). Train your CCP staff.