#roadtomsw

Today is the last day of data collection for the Jewish Community Social Services Needs Assessment, which is very exciting! Today also marks the second week of the intervention phase of my Single Subject Design, which is looking at using a sleep hygiene intervention to treat sleep disturbances caused by military related PTSD.

I am very excited to begin looking at the data from both studies, and extremely excited to see the data that the Fitbit has been collecting for the Single Subject Design in a few weeks! It’s going to be fun coding the survey responses and journal entries, and going over the raw data that we’ve collected (a good mix of quantitative and qualitative research)!

April is also shaping up to be a busy month. I’m looking forward to attending the Jewish Educator Holocaust Training Workshop on April 10, 2016 with some of my colleagues from Jewish Family Service. Given the workshop’s focus on using survivor testimony as a tool for both education and healing, I’m sure that there’s a lot we’ll be able to bring back and use in our work. I’m also really looking forward to taking part in UB’s Restorative Justice Day on April 29, 2016, which promises to be an intense and meaningful day, and one that will further expand my Social Work toolkit and skill set.

I have one more paper to write for my Veteran’s and Military Families class (which is also related to sleep disturbances stemming from PTSD, but from an entirely different perspective than my Single Subject Design - it seems to be one of my main research interests these days), and then on May 6, 2016 we’ll be able to call this semester a wrap! I’ll then have a few weeks to rest and catch up (and go camping and hiking!) before the Summer Session begins on May 31, 2016 :-)

So I was not as successful as I had hoped to be last semester in keeping this blog up to date, so we’ll start in medias res (as all the best stories do) and pretend that we’ve been keeping up with one another this entire time, and I’ll promise to do my part to actually make use of this as a resource to talk about my work, my research, share information that I think is interesting/relevant, and practice self care through journaling, and you’ll all be cool with that! Agreed? Agreed.

Last semester ended incredibly well (good grades all around), and this semester continues to bring with it challenges, and opportunities, and a myriad of other things that we’ll dive into in future blog posts as we get caught up.

To bring everyone up to speed, last semester I took Theories of Human Behavior (SW500) and Scientific Methods in Social Work (SW510). This semester I am taking Evaluation in Social Work (SW514) which is a continuation of SW510 (same professor, same cohort, same class time and day) as well as Introduction to Issues in Veteran and Military Family Care (SW720), which has turned into an incredible toolkit as I begin to work with veterans in my role as a Community Care Coordinator at JFS.

I am also working on some really interesting research projects at the moment. First, I’m working on a Community Needs Assessment of the Jewish Community here in Buffalo, NY for my Evaluation in Social Work (SW514) class, and my work at Jewish Family Service of Buffalo & Erie County.

I’m also working on a Single Subject Design research project that’s examining the use of a sleep hygiene intervention to treat sleep disturbances in veterans that show symptomatology of PTSD, and who are also experiencing military related sleep disturbances (i.e. sleep avoidance, military sleep schedules, hyper vigilant sleep behaviors, etc). What makes this project so interesting (for me) is that it’s one of the first few to use a Fitbit as a measurement device (to track sleep quality and duration) along with the Epworth Sleepiness Scale, and I’m curious and excited to see what the results will be.

I also registered for summer courses this week. so this summer I will be taking: SW503 - Diversity & Oppression SW506 - Theories of Organizational Behavior and Development SW554 - Motivational Interviewing SW580 - Psychopathology SW716 - Professional Writing & Documentation in Social Work

And I’m looking forward to once again presenting at the Buffalo Unconference again in April, where I’ll be giving a talk entitled Rise of the Food Gnomes! Moving food pantries away from bureaucracy and institutionalism toward person and community centered empowerment, and urban agriculture.

I’m finally outlining my potential path to graduate school, taking down deadlines, planning out a timeline for tests and document collection. Looking at my first choice and it looks like it is going to be a very long road to be quite honest. My main goal is to apply to SDSU’s MSW/JD concurrent program for Fall 2016 (deadline to apply is March 1). I’m still looking for other options but this is the most complete road to my goal, keeps my desire to get a legal education, and along with the benefits of being local (and thus lowering cost).

Looking over the admissions requirements I just noticed there is a required 500 hours of volunteer/internship/paid human services work.