Job Description

Job Description

Job Description

Child First is an intensive, early childhood, two-generation, home visiting model that helps families build strong, nurturing relationships that heal and protect young children (prenatal through age five years) from the impact of trauma and chronic stress, with the goal of healing. Child First strives to identify children at the earliest possible time to provide care for emotional and behavioral health, developmental and learning success, and connection with services and resources to support the family’s success/wellbeing/stability. Child First has been recognized as an evidence-based home visiting model by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under the Maternal, infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) Program and rated “Effective” by the National Registry for Effective Programs and Practice (NREPP)) of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration (SAMHSA).

Summary

The Care Coordinator partners with a Mental Health and Developmental Clinician to support families referred to Child First. The Care Coordinator works collaboratively with the family to connect the child and family with desired, community-based services and supports while maintaining Child First’s reflective, relationship-based stance. The Care Coordinator also enhances caregiver executive functioning skills (e.g., planning, organizing, managing time, focusing attention, regulating emotions, reflecting on progress) and engages the caregiver-child dyad in activities to strengthen the relationship. Through their work with families, the Care Coordinator both decreases the “toxic” stress in the home environment and enhances opportunities for optimal child development, thereby promoting healthy brain development for infants and young children. The best candidate for this position is highly organized, self-motivated, reliable, and flexible (including willingness to work non-traditional hours, including at least one evening) with an openness to learning, capacity for self-reflection, eagerness to participate in reflective clinical supervision and desire to be part of a team.

Position Type

Full-time Non-Exempt

Key Job Responsibilities

• Provide community resource expertise to Child First team and families, including identifying and collaborating with community-based service providers and supports.
• Engage with the Child First family and the Clinician in the collaborative family assessment process (i.e., use data from interviews, observations, interactions, and standardized measures to identify family strengths, needs, and challenges).
• Promote family stabilization by working collaboratively with family to identify and support needs (both urgent and long-term), integrating service needs into the Child and Family Plan of Care, and addressing barriers to services as they arise.
• Enhance caregiver executive functioning skills (e.g., planning, organizing, managing time, focusing attention, regulating emotions, reflecting on progress) as needed and in consultation with the Clinician and Clinical Supervisor.
• Maintain a reflective stance when engaging with the caregiver to understand their motivation, needs, and possible barriers to new services and supports.
• Use videotaping to enhance both therapeutic work with families and reflective supervision.
• Provide the family with interactive, growth-promoting play experiences.
• Engage in weekly individual, team, and group reflective clinical supervision with Clinical Supervisor.
• Engage actively in all aspects of the Child First Learning Collaborative, including in-person or live-remote training, distance learning curriculum, and specialty training.
• Track completion of all assessments and enter in the appropriate database.

• Keep all appropriate documentation for clinical accountability and reimbursement.
• Maintain schedule and complete tasks to achieve home visiting Benchmarks and meet Accreditation standards.
• Participate in other clinical and administrative activities as appropriate.

Competencies

• Knowledge of early childhood development, parent education, parent-child relationships, and

individual, family, and community-level risk factors (e.g., poverty, homelessness, maternal depression, domestic violence, substance abuse, teen parenthood).

• Knowledge of and experience with community-based services and supports in service area, highly valued.

• Experience working in home and community-based settings with diverse cultures and ethnicities preferred.
• Able to speak a second language (Spanish, Portuguese, Creole, other), highly valued.
• Able to communicate well verbally and in writing.
• Comfortable with computers and experienced with Word and Excel.
• Reliable vehicle and appropriate insurance for home visits.

Supervisory Responsibility

No

Required Education and Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in child development, psychology, nursing, human services, or related field preferred.
• A minimum of three years working with culturally diverse families and young children under the age of six years preferred.

Volunteers of America South Central Louisiana, Inc. offers a comprehensive benefit package to include: Health, Dental, and Vision Insurance, 403-B Pension Plan, Short and Long Term Disability Insurances, Life Insurance, paid annual holidays, Vacation and Sick leave.

Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action employer, Volunteers of America South Central Louisiana, Inc. considers applicants for all positions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, gender, national origin, age, disability, marital or veteran status, or any legally protected status. We will make reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with known disabilities unless doing so would result in an undue hardship.

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