registrations and papers are already coming in for the 2013 online SRV Journal conference

It’s very gratifying and exciting that registrations for the 2013 online SRV Journal conference are already coming in. I’m also happy to say that some Citizen Advocacy folks are registering as well, which should really enhance our online discussions.

We also already have a conference paper uploaded as well! And lots more to come.

If you’d like to register or some more information, please let me know at journalATsrvip.org

thanks

Marc Tumeinski

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article: Person Centred Practice in India

This article mentions Social Role Valorization (SRV), including the process of wounding, societally valued roles, and the 10 themes.

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a follow-up post about the recent SRV-10 leadership development session in Australia

I just received the following post from Meg Sweeney, who attended the July 2013 leadership development session on SRV-10 (see previous post):

 

I have enjoyed a rare opportunity to participate in the Australian SRV- 10 study group hosted by Senior Trainer John Armstrong and his lovely wife Lynne.

Learning and presenting material in this regular and consistent fashion has greatly deepened my knowledge of Social Role Valorization as an empirical strategy.

As a long-term implementer of SRV, participating in this learning has greatly improved my academic knowledge of the theory.

This in turn has improved my capacity to promote SRV’s legitimacy and relevance in assisting those on the margins of our society to enjoy ‘the good things of life.’

I commend the study group model to both academic and grass roots practitioners of SRV, as we have a lot to learn from each other in relation to understanding, implementing and promoting SRV.

Meg Sweeney, Vincentia, Australia

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guest post about a leadership development session in Australia

I just received an update from John Armstrong concerning an SRV 10 Study Group in Australia, meeting in Melbourne (check out this post about the inaugural session of the study group). Please see below for details from John. This group is one example of a leadership development effort focused on Social Role Valorization (SRV) training. As we know, Wolf Wolfensberger (who formulated SRV theory) was committed to and encouraged leadership development around SRV training and implementation.

We know there are other examples out there, big and small, and we encourage you to share these details with us so that we can post about them. Hopefully, what is going on in Melbourne and elsewhere will inspire others to focus on SRV 10 and PASSING leadership development, with an eye towards helping societally devalued people to have greater access to the ‘good things of life.’ My thanks to John and my encouragement to the members of the SRV 10 study group. Marc Tumeinski

 

We have just finished day one of the 4th SRV 10 Study Group here in Melbourne, Australia. Four student presenters are present with one participant audience member providing testing questions and meaty discussion.  Our fifth and final session is planned to be held in February 2014 before the  SRV group in Hobart, Tasmania, though several members will still need to do ‘make up events’ to fufill their compliment of 5 sessions and to present all the modules of SRV 10 at least once, and to hear them being presented by others at least another 4 times.

It is proving such an enriching and enjoyable way to really study SRV in a concentrated way; sharing all meals and staying together under the one roof and developing close bonds of friendship. The development of each student is so apparent as confidence with the material and ease of presentation increases.

A new second Study Group of 5 new people are commencing the first week of February 2013!

thanks, John Armstrong

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just arrived: vol 2 no 1 of the Journal of the Christian Institute on Disability

I have mentioned Dr. Jeff McNair of CalBaptist University in past posts (here and here). Jeff is the senior editor of the Journal of the Christian Institute on Disability (check this post about an article that we wrote together for that journal). Jeff has sponsored a 4 day leadership SRV workshop in California, and often mentions SRV and Wolfensberger in his own blog and writings.

The latest issue of the journal has a number of articles relevant to SRV theory and implementation. Over the next couple weeks, I will post about some of these articles. I’d like to start with the lead article by Angela Novak Amado entitled ‘The courage to bridge worlds.’

First, though, about the journal: As may be obvious from its name, the journal is focused on issues around the church and society in terms of children and adults with a variety of impairments. Students of SRV will remember that one of the role domains described in SRV is that of ‘cultus, values,’ which includes roles related to church membership (Wolfensberger, SRV monograph, 2013, p. 50). The article “Some of the universal ‘good things of life’ which the implementation of Social Role Valorization can be expected to make more accessible to devalued people” by Wolfensberger, Thomas and Caruso (1996) describes one of these ‘good things of life’ as “a transcendent belief system that gives the human being spiritual anchors” (Wolfensberger, SRV monograph, 2013, p. 176). Churches and other religious congregations do offer one normative avenue toward integration and participation.

Back to Amado’s article ‘The courage to bridge worlds.’ The article is an important read for those interested in SRV for several reasons. It addresses the enormous segregation gap which still exists in our society, and in other societies around the world, between those who are societally valued and those who are societally devalued, particularly devaluation in response to physical and intellectual impairment. It analyzes this gap from a social, systemic and human service perspective. It also makes recommendations for action. Each of these pieces resonates well with SRV theory, including SRV’s coverage of societal devaluation and wounding (Wolfensberger, SRV monograph, 2013, pp. 21-44). Amado’s article especially ties in with the wounds of rejection, distantiation, relationship discontinuity and predominance of ‘boughten’ relationships. However, it also connects nicely with the SRV theme of personal social integration and valued social/societal participation. Lastly, Amado analyzes both programmatic and non-programmatic issues related to the above. The article includes a description of two national (US) programs aimed at supporting local congregations to support freely-given relationships with those who have impairments.

One helpful heuristic which I believe SRV can add to this discussion is the focus on societally valued roles, specifically in terms of personal social integration and valued social/societal participation, as brought out for example in leadership level workshops on Social Role Valorization and in Lemay’s February 2006 article entitled ‘Social Role Valorization Insights Into the Social Integration Conundrum’ (Mental Retardation, 44(1), 1-12).

Marc Tumeinski

 

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video: Restraint and Seclusion: Hear Our Stories

Filmmaker Dan Habib has put together a 30 minute film on the use of restraint and seclusion in schools. It is free to use and show, and includes video of several students describing their experiences of being restrained.

Marc Tumeinski

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initial list of ideas and topics for the 1st annual SRV Journal online conference

As mentioned in my last post, we are looking forward to our first annual SRV Journal online conference which will open in September. Why are we hosting this conference? We believe that Social Role Valorization (SRV), when well applied, has great potential to help societally devalued groups and individuals to gain greater access to the ‘good things of life,’ and to be spared at least some of the negative effects (‘wounds’) of social devaluation. One of our major purposes in hosting this online conference is to foster, extend and deepen dialogue about, and understanding of, SRV.

We believe that informed and open discussions of SRV, and even constructive debates about it, can only help to promote its dissemination, significance and application.( This was one of the lessons which Wolfensberger taught us by his own example of engaging in writing, publication, written dialogue with other thinkers and writers, and so on.) Therefore, we encourage people with a range of experience with SRV to contribute papers to this online conference hosted by the SRV Journal and the SRV Implementation Project. We invite papers from those in a variety of roles and from a variety of human services.

We do expect that contributors will have at least some basic understanding of the key ideas and goals of SRV, gained for example by studying relevant resources, taking a university course during which SRV materials were studied, attending a multi-day SRV workshop, and so on. In a future post, we will list some of these learning opportunities and resources. We are particularly interested in receiving submissions from family members, friends and servers of societally devalued people who are trying to put the ideas of SRV into practice, even if they do not consider themselves as writers or conference presenters.

We invite your help in beginning to shape this online conference. Below is a beginning list of examples of submission topics, to get the ball rolling, but we encourage you to reply to this post with other ideas and suggestions for SRV relevant topics. Topics might include for example:

• SRV as relevant to a wide variety of human services; and in different locales around the world
• descriptions and analyses of social devaluation and wounding
• descriptions and analyses of the impact(s) of valued social roles
• illustrations of particular SRV themes
• research into and development of the theory of SRV and its particular themes
• analysis of new developments (e.g., in human services) from an SRV perspective
• success stories, as well as struggles and lessons learned, in trying to implement SRV
• book or movie reviews and notices from an SRV perspective
• reasoned, informed and constructive debate around SRV

Marc Tumeinski

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Announcing the 1st annual SRV Journal online conference

I am pleased to announce that we are going to run an SRV Journal  ‘online conference’ starting in September 2013. The event will be entirely online and will be based on submitted papers (e.g., there will not be any recorded talks or presentations). The conference will essentially consist of reading others’ papers, as well as dialog back and forth between participants.

The reflective process of writing about Social Role Valorization (SRV) training, theory and/or implementation is an opportunity to deepen one’s understanding of SRV, and also invites readers to learn more about it. As such, writing can be a key tool of leadership development. Dialog with others is another great tool toward leadership development and deeper learning. This annual online conference will be a forum for both writing and dialog.

How would this work? The basic idea is that interested participants would register, submit a paper on an SRV relevant topic, make comments on other papers, and (optionally) submit revised papers to the SRV Journal for possible publication. There would be deadlines for each step. At this point, I envision the online conference opening for registration in August, papers due in October, comments during November, and optional submission to the Journal in December. We will offer a broad range of possible SRV-relevant topics to write about.

We envision people from many different backgrounds, countries and ranges of experience with SRV to participate. We want to receive submissions from those teaching SRV and those just learning about SRV, from those working or volunteering in human services and those who have a family member or friend receiving services. I specifically want to encourage university students who are studying SRV to participate. For those of you who are professors including aspects of SRV in your teaching, I encourage you to consider including participation in the conference in your syllabus and/or as an ‘extra credit’ option.

I will continue to share more ideas and details about the conference over the coming weeks and months, as a way of getting the word out, encouraging participation, and seeking feedback on the conference model itself. Please share this with others and be in touch with any comments or constructive suggestions.

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4th edition of the SRV monograph

I am just looking through a copy of the 4th edition of  ‘A Brief Introduction to Social Role Valorization’ by Wolf Wolfensberger, which includes the text of the 3rd edition, plus two additional articles, a list of Wolfensberger’s publications, and an index (published by Valor Press). We plan to have reviews of the monograph in The SRV Journal.

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Socially valued role of neighbor

One of the major role domains described by Wolfensberger (SRV monograph, 3rd (rev) ed., p. 30) is that associated with one’s residence or domicile. One of the socially valued roles within this domain is that of good neighbor. What good things of life can this valued role potentially open the door to? Such things as a place to call home, belonging within a relatively small-scale social body, positive interactions with neighbors, friends, opportunities, positive expectations, respect, etc.

Social roles include certain responsibilities and behaviors (SRV monograph, p. 25). What behaviors and responsibilities are part of the valued role of good neighbor? Greeting the neighbors, not being noisy, keeping the yard clean, not being nosy, visiting the neighbors, inviting neighbors over, offering to help neighbors (e.g., pick something up at the store), etc.

In my experience, residential service programs can too often and too easily use the role language of neighbor about service recipients (e.g., in a group residence or staffed apartment), but without service recipients actually filling the valued role of good neighbor. One litmus test is, does the service recipient actually receive any of the ‘good things of life’ from the valued role of good neighbor? Another is, do they carry out any of the responsibilities of the good neighbor role? If so, how often? We can also consider the role communicators (e.g., setting, social juxtapositions and grouping, activity, language, appearance, etc.): do these individually and together communicate the role of good neighbor for a particular person?

Good neighbor is a valued role that can open the door to some of the good things of life, but it does not come automatically. Remember John McKnight’s warning: “One wonders how it is possible, in a small town of 5,000 people, to find a typical house and have five residents live there for ten years without any effective community relationships. Yet human service systems designed to provide what are called ‘community services’ often have managed to do just that” (John McKnight, ‘Redefining Community’ in The Careless Society: Community and its Counterfeits, NY: Basic Books, 1995, p. 116).

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