This training series is comprised of 10 half-day live streaming modules which build upon and deepen concepts introduced in the Foundations series. The series is designed for therapists who have completed Level 1 ESFT certification and are currently working toward Level 2 ESFT certification. Typically, these are therapists in their second and third year of family-based training. Each of the 10 modules are structured similarly. They begin with a one-hour didactic describing one ESFT concept or skill and a video demonstrating the concept or skill. There are then two case presentations including videotaped family sessions where application of these concepts and methods are discussed. The case material is often used to create role-plays so that all participants have an opportunity to practice ESFT skills. 

The overarching goals for the core clinical series are aligned with the skills required to complete Level 2 certification. These include the following: 

1. Deepen trainees’ ability to develop trauma-informed, developmentally grounded, systemic case conceptualizations that link children’s presenting problems to the relational context of the family and community ecosystem.
2. Sharpen trainees’ ability to identify, track, and utilize emotional processes therapeutically in family sessions. 
3. Strengthen trainees’ ability to recognize personal or team induction into negative family process and effectively regain a balanced therapeutic position.   
4. Consistently recognize opportunities to disrupt the NIP and use enactments to help families build more functional patterns. 
5. Consistently keep the focus on relationships in sessions and maintain a facilitative role. 
6. Maintain equal empathy for all family members and cultivate a positive, strength-based collaborative relationship with them.  

This series counts toward required annual training hours in Family Based Mental Health Services but is not currently available for CE credit.

Core Clinical Topics

Training Hours: 8:30am-1:00pm
Training Hours Provided: 4.5

Core Clinical Training 1: Understanding FASD
Summer Krochta, LCSW & Jessica Sachs

This presentation provides an overview of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, common symptoms and challenging behaviors. FASD is more common than ASD, impacting an estimated 640,000 in Pennsylvanians, yet the majority are never diagnosed. It is likely that the incidence of this neurological condition, which is associated with major behavioral challenges, is quite high in the population of youth and families served by FBMHS. As a result of attending this training participants recognize common symptoms of FASD, recognize the importance of early identification, and identify appropriate referral pathways.

Core Clinical Training 2: Modifying FBMHS Interventions to be More Effective for Youth with FASD
Summer Krochta, LCSW & Jessica Sachs

Individuals with FASD often fail in typical treatment settings when this neurological condition is not recognized, resulting in repeated treatment failures frustrating staff and increasing costs of intensive services. In this training, participants  are presented with  FASD-informed strategies that can be easily integrated into family-based treatment to better support caregivers and youth impacted by FASD. This includes using crisis stabilization, psychoeducation, and skill-building to align better with the cognitive and behavioral profile of individuals with FASD.

Core Clinical Training 3: Dialogues with the Masters of Family Therapy
Adam Bogusk, MDiv

In this presentation, Adam discusses clips from a pre-recorded conversation with Jorge Colapinto, LMFT, about creating opportunities for change in the room and maximizing the present moment. Jorge has a 50-year history in the world of systemic family therapy as a therapist, teacher, and consultant in family therapy and social services, both in this country and abroad. He collaborated with Dr. Salvador Minuchin for 18 years, first at the Philadelphia Child Guidance Clinic and later at the Family Studies Institute in New York. Mr Colapinto has co-authored several books on Structural Family Therapy with him. He brings an incredible amount of wisdom to FBMHS.  

Core Clinical Training 4: Regulate, Relate, and Reason
C. Wayne Jones, PhD

This presentation is part of a series on strategies for promoting emotion regulation in  families prone to rapidly escalate into reactivity and conflict. Clips are shown from a lecture given by Dr. Bruce Perry, MD, PhD, where he introduces the NeuroSequential model of therapeutics, which is the basis of the well-known rubric “ Regulate, Relate, & Reason. Dr. Jones explains how this rubric can be used to guide therapists’ responses to reactive youth and their caregivers.

Core Clinical Training 5:  Dialogues with the Masters of Family Therapy
Adam Bogusk, MDiv

In this presentation, Mr. Boguski discusses clips from a pre-recorded conversation with Andy Fussner, MSW, about joining and what he’s learned about putting highly distressed, untrusting families at ease. Andy has a 45-year history in the world of systemic family therapy as a clinician, supervisor, consultant, and teacher. His systemic roots began at the Philadelphia Child Guidance Center with Dr. Salvador Minuchin, who is credited with providing the theoretical and practical foundation of ESFT and Pennsylvania’s FBMHS.

Core Clinical Training 6: Mindfulness, Emotion Regulation, and FBMHS
Adam Bogusk, MDiv

This presentation is part of a series on strategies for promoting emotion regulation in  families prone to rapidly escalate into reactivity and conflict. In this training, Adam uses clips edited from a didactic given by Karin Bleecker, MS, two years ago for FBMHS therapists. The clips explain emotion regulation and bottom-up processing and describe how mindfulness practices can be used to assist with family members who become emotionally dysregulated. The discussion focuses on how to integrate mindfulness practices into ESFT. 

Core Clinical Training 7: Recognizing Common Patterns in Embattled Families
C. Wayne Jones, PhD

Embattled families are marked by an intense power-struggle between the caregivers, creating an emotional war zone where pressure is placed on children, extended family, friends, and professionals to choose sides. In this presentation Dr. Jones highlights common traps and triangles in working with these families.

Core Clinical Training 8: General Dynamics of Stepfamilies
Scott Browning, PhD

This presentation highlights how  the stepfamily is qualitatively distinct from the first-unit family. Whether married or not, the family in which a non-parent adult is in a parenting role, produces consistent and expected challenges. As a result of attending this training, participants will recognize these challenges and have a range of psychoeducation topics to assist the stepfamily in understanding systemic reasons why they may be struggling.

Core Clinical Training 9: A Subsystem Approach to Treating  Stepfamilies
Scott Browning, PhD

In this presentation, Dr. Browning introduces a 10-Step approach to addressing stepfamily needs based on his book. He shows how these guidelines can be incorporated into ESFT-FBMHS. These steps assist the therapist in focusing clinical interventions in a useful manner. As a result of attending this training, participants will recognize how these 10 steps can assist stepfamilies in feeling understood and clinically safe and make the structural changes necessary to function more effectively.

Core Clinical Training 10: A Guide for Treating Embattled Families 
C. Wayne Jones, PhD

Avoiding becoming triangulated into the conflict between waring caregivers while maintaining a balanced therapeutic alliance, is one of the most challenging aspects of treating embattled families, but essential to being helpful.  In this presentation, Dr. Jones provides tips for keeping the child’s needs at the center of treatment and creating boundaries to protect them from toxic triangulation.