Clinical Social Worker Contractor

PROGRESSIVE LIFE CENTER•Newark, DE

10h•Hybrid

About The Position

Progressive Life Center, Inc. (PLC) provides culturally-sensitivity human services to children, youth and families in the District of Columbia and surrounding Maryland, throughout Greater Philadelphia, and in most of Delaware. PLC’s array of community-based services includes foster care and adoption, independent living for youth aging out of foster care, family preservation, juvenile diversion, and parenting skills training. For more than two decades, PLC has earned accreditation from the prestigious Council on Accreditation (COA) for its demonstration of excellence in the delivery of services and achievement of outcomes. Since 1990, PLC Delaware has effectively provided statewide specialized and treatment foster care services, more recently enhancing its programming to provide independent living supports to youth aging out of care, a hotline for foster parents facing crisis (After Hours Crisis Support) and supports for institutionalized foster youth (Parent Partner Program). Through our specialized and treatment foster care, PLC serves children from birth through youth age 23. Intervention focuses on mental health and behavioral issues, permanence and placement stability, and preparation for independence. Hallmarks of the program include use of PLC’s NTU™ Service Delivery Model, skills building group activities, extensive work with birth and foster parents, stakeholder engagement and community involvement, and an LCSW/MSW professional team approach.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree from an accredited college/university in social work or the related human services fields of child welfare, counseling, psychology, child psychology, family studies, or sociology.
Experience in providing services to at-risk children.
Demonstrated ability and enthusiasm for working collaboratively and with flexibility.
Evidence of effective professional oral and writing skills.
Valid driver’s license, access to a vehicle, and ability to travel within the Delaware region.

Nice To Haves

Knowledge of and experience with Afrocentric or other spiritually focused models or a strengths perspective highly desirable.

Responsibilities

Coordinating and facilitating individualized treatment planning and review process for each child or youth assigned to the care team.
Providing support to foster families treating children placed in their homes.
Conducting clinically oriented family sessions in homes of treatment foster families.
Advocating for children and youth in the courts, schools, and other community agencies as needed.
Ensuring that treatment families receive community-based services as needed.
Conducting appropriate discharge planning in accordance with permanency plans, for each child or youth assigned.
Providing appropriate interventions to resolve crises.
Comply with DFS requirements and DELACARE regulations for child placement agencies.
Adhere to agency and COA guidelines for standards of care and outcomes expectation.
Conduct bio-psychosocial assessments of children and youth referred for placement.
Maintain current and comprehensive clinical case files and reports for each child/youth.
Work jointly with families, clinical therapists, and other providers as members of a care team.
Collaborate with community-based providers in the best interests of each child/youth.
Participate in clinical training, clinical supervision, multidisciplinary team meetings and other clinical educational activities as scheduled.
Attend and participate in agency related training, in-services, workshops and major events as needed.
Be available for emergent calls sometimes received after hours.
Attend court hearings, administrative reviews, permanency planning meetings and other relevant meetings.
Conduct home studies, when necessary.
Enter and maintain accurate data into the PLC database (e.g., FamCare) and DFS FOCUS systems.
Other duties as assigned.