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Organizational Stress’ Impact in the Helping Professions

As our society and helping organizations and systems adjust to CoVID-19 being endemic to our world, the human services system continues to hear about the amount of organizational stress our systems have worked through and the impact that it has on the professionals in those systems. Much of the research and conversation around this subject includes how workers’ levels of Secondary Traumatic Stress (STS) are impacted by the level of organizational stress their agency is experiencing, as well...

Partnering with a Purpose: Creating behavioral health services for youth in foster care

The “Accessible, Quality Continuum of Behavioral Health Services” workgroup is one of the six workgroups convening monthly in the Vaya Health Pathways to Permanency project. Participants who join the monthly sessions are from across the Vaya Health catchment area and work in child welfare, Medicaid managed care, behavioral health, and child placement. This cross-system group of professionals is tasked with developing solutions to challenges identified during the beginning of the project. In...

Prevention Team Success at Cabarrus County DSS

Benchmarks would like to draw attention to the phenomenal work being done by the Cabarrus County DSS Prevention Team. The Prevention Team was established in 2018 with two social workers on a mission: ensuring families were connected to needed community resources resulting in no further referrals for mandatory services (services mandated by the state to families when Child Protective Service reports meet the general statue definition of abuse, neglect, or dependency). By focusing on the...

Vaya's Pathways to Permanency Project: Utilizing (b)(3) Respite to Support School Suspension

Since 2021 Benchmarks has been consulting with Vaya Health on a project called Pathways to Permanency . This project aims to coordinate efforts between Vaya, County DSS offices, and mental health providers to ensure youth in foster care have access to high quality behavioral health services. To better understand the needs of children, families, and professionals within Vaya’s catchment, landscape analyses and several focus groups were conducted. Main themes from initial discoveries were then...

Trauma-Informed Consultation within Agencies

Benchmarks has implemented 2 projects across the state over the past 12 years, Partnering for Excellence (PFE) and the Standardized Assessment Protocol (SAP). Both projects are implemented within County DSS offices with a goal of ensuring children and families in child welfare have access to trauma screening and subsequent Trauma-intensive Comprehensive Clinical Assessments (TiCCAs). Having access to TiCCAs provides an opportunity for the child and family to receive holistic recommendations...

The Benefits of Peer Sharing Across Projects

As mental health agencies make decisions regarding whether they want to participate in pilot projects, it is beneficial for them to gather valuable information including feedback from agencies who already participate in the projects. Trauma-intensive Comprehensive Clinical Assessment (TiCCA) clinicians Dale Smith of the Children’s Center of Northwest NC and Mollie Hedgecock of Rockingham County Youth Services participated in an information session with behavioral healthcare providers who are...

Creating a Common Language & Shared Understanding

The “Common Language & Shared Understanding” workgroup is one of the 6 workgroups that meet monthly as part of the Pathways to Permanency project. Participants who join the monthly sessions are from across the Vaya Health catchment area and work in child welfare, Medicaid managed care, behavioral health, and child placement. This cross-system group of professionals is tasked with developing solutions to challenges identified during the beginning of the project. The focus of this...

January is Mental Wellness Month

In efforts to promote the importance of maintaining good mental health, the month of January has been designated as “Mental Wellness Month”. With nearly one in five U.S. adults living with mental illness ( NIMH, 2022 ), it is important that we all take the time to check in on our mental health. Those who have suffered from trauma are often at higher risk of experiencing mental illness. The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) study correlated that those with four or more ACEs were more...

Partners Health Management Continues to Partner for Innovative Pilot Project

This week we are giving a shout out to Partners Health Management! They are a valuable teammate in making the Standardized Assessment Protocol (SAP) project successful, and Benchmarks is proud to be partnering with this organization. Partners serves as a Managed Care Organization (MCO) for clients with mental health concerns, intellectual and developmental disabilities, as well as substance use disorders, managing services for the behavioral health care needs of these populations. Partners...

Engaging Birth Parents in Child Welfare and Behavioral Health Systems Improvement Projects

The Pathways to Permanency project, a VAYA Health initiative to align the work of the child welfare and behavioral health systems, is continuing to make progress by engaging participants from each of the six workgroups to create sustainable change. Each workgroup has identified multiple solutions for which they are currently developing implementation plans. It has been salient to the workgroup participants that individuals with lived experience are engaged in this work and have space to...

Rockingham County DHHS-DSS Spotlight

Rockingham County Department of Health & Human Services-Division of Social Services is adept at participating in pilot projects in the health and human services realm, and is always interested in doing innovative, trauma-informed work that is for the benefit of the children & families they serve. In 2019, Rockingham County chose to participate in Benchmarks’ Standardized Assessment Protocol (SAP) project and sought to provide foster children with the opportunity to receive a holistic...

Benchmarks Offers "Trauma & Resilience" Training

Beginning January 2023, Benchmarks’ Center for Quality Integration will add “Trauma & Resilience” to our catalog of offered trainings. “Trauma & Resilience” uses the National Childhood Traumatic Stress Networks’ (NCTSN’s) Child Welfare Trauma Training Toolkit as its base curricula with influences from our teams’ own “on the ground” knowledge, research, and experiences. Across North Carolina, Benchmarks has been assisting communities in efforts to become more trauma-informed over the...

Helpful Takeaways From Trauma 101 Training

Benchmarks’ Partnering for Excellence (PFE) aims to cultivate trauma-informed communities among child welfare systems across the state of North Carolina. In addition to helping community partners implement a trauma-informed pathway for child welfare involved youth, Benchmarks’ PFE hosts a bi-annual NCTSN Trauma 101 Training for social workers and community members. Pitt and Craven Counties recently wrapped up their fall Trauma 101 Training. The four-day training dives deep into what trauma...

The Standardized Assessment Protocol Welcomes Cabarrus County to the Fold

Benchmarks is excited to welcome Cabarrus County DSS as the newest member of our Standardized Assessment Protocol (SAP) project! The SAP project is a process created to ensure prompt trauma screening for children over the age of four entering foster care to quickly identify a child’s need for further assessment, which increases their likelihood to receive the treatment necessary to reach their full potential. This treatment goes beyond just mental and behavioral health; treatment...

Implementing Trauma Training at Cabarrus County DSS

The National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) was created by Congress in 2000 as part of the Children’s Health Act to “raise the standard of care and increase access to services for children and families who experience or witness traumatic events.” This unique network of frontline providers, family members, researchers, and national partners is committed to changing the course of children’s lives by improving their care and moving scientific gains quickly into practice across the U.S.

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