University of Southern Maine School of Social Work
Agency Profile for Undergraduate/Graduate Student Placements
Name of agency: Child-Centered Solutions for Everyone
Date: 12-12-2011
Agency address: 209 Main Street Freeport Maine 04032
Agency telephone phone number: 207-423-2953
In arranging for field placements, whom should student contact?
Name of Field Instructor:
Susan Wiggin, LMSW
Field Instructor telephone number: 207-423-2953
Field Instructor email address: susanwiggingal@gmail.com
Site Supervisor: Susan Wiggin, LMSW; Anita St.Onge, Esq
Name of agency director and/or key administrative personnel:
Name
Position
Susan Wiggin; Anita St.Onge
Do you offer a stipend?
Agency is able to handle:
Co-Directors
No
BSW student____
MSW foundation year student_____
MSW concentration year student __X___
How many students can your agency accommodate? 3
Briefly describe the basic services/programs of the agency, client population served, and the size of your
staff.
This is a pilot project intended to place students spring 2012 and to begin the internship fall 2012. This is a
unique internship that will pair MSW interns with law students to work primarily with low-income,
unrepresented parents experiencing divorce and separation. The internship will involve working with families in
the District Courthouse, interacting with District Judges, lawyers, and law students. It will involve providing
education directly to parents, screening for intimate partner abuse, providing appropriate referrals as necessary
as well as working with co-parenting dyads along with your law students counterpart to create parenting plans.
A strong knowledge base of child development, the impact of divorce and separation, the emotional process of
divorce, and referral sources will be developed. You will also be directly involved with the implementation of a
brand new program and all the unknowns that this entails.
When (day and time) are agency staff and other important meetings held?
Students must be available every Monday from 8am-5pm without any room for negotiation. One other day will
be identified as the other primary day for the internship, TBD. There will also be mandatory participation,
particularly at the beginning of the internship for some Saturday programs, which will serve as additional
training for the students.
What characteristics or qualities would be helpful for a student to have to best utilize the
placement as a learning opportunity?
We require that students be prepared to present themselves in a highly professional way, including being
properly dresses for court proceedings, working within the court setting, as well as when you are working
directly with clients; this means formal business attire (men in business suits with ties, and dress shoes; and
women in either business pants suits or skirt suits, dress shoes).
You will be working directly with parents and collateral professionals from a variety of sources; you should
exude confidence, professionalism, intelligence, and maturity.
Would a student who needs a highly structured learning environment do well in this placement?
____Yes _X___No Other comments: Students in this internship will need to be extremely flexible, work
well under pressure, be able to tolerate sometimes harsh criticism from clients, take direction from supervisors
as well as court personnel, and be open to getting comfortable within the courthouse environment. The students
must also be clear that the learning curve will be very high for the directors of the program as well as the court
staff. This will provide many learning opportunities in and of itself. Our motto will be flexibility.
List the learning opportunities available for the student in your setting:
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Working within a courthouse setting
Working with a variety of collateral professionals including meeting with our advisory board, going to
meet with clinicians and staff at a variety of other agencies and private practices
Attending trainings provided by the Judicial Branch
Working directly with parents experiencing divorce and separation
Becoming conversant in the specialized field of working with families who are intersecting with the
Courts.
Education, knowledge, screening in intimate partner violence and how these dynamics often change how
we think about what will work best for families.
Identifying clients who may be experiencing challenges with substance abuse, mental illness, intellectual
impediments, or combinations thereof
Becoming conversant in the literature and language of working with families experiencing divorce, high
conflict divorce and the multitude of services available to them
Being an intrical part of a fledging project that will directly serve 800 clients per year.
Developing protocols for determining the program’s efficiency
Is there adequate physical space for the student(s)? The Judicial Branch has assigned us a large courtroom to
utilize for the courtroom aspect of our project. We are currently writing grants to support the program, which
will include appropriate office space.
Does the student need a car? Yes
Is mileage reimbursable? No
Can your agency provide an opportunity for students to fulfill part of their required placement hours on
evenings or weekends?
Minimal
Does your agency require any formal training for interns? Yes; the training will be incorporated into the
internship hours. The directors will provide students with the details of other training opportunities that will be
mandatory (attending a Kid’s First program, for example) as well as a multitude of other trainings throughout
the year, which the students will be able to pick and choose from.
If yes, how many training hours are required?
When is the training offered?
Can the training be completed online? No
Is the agency handicapped accessible? The courthouse is and we are doing our best to secure office space
that is, although we cannot confirm that yet
Agency Requirements:
Background check (SBI)
Yes___
No___ possible
Physical Exam
Yes___
No __X_
Immunizations
Yes___
No _X__
(If yes, please name
immunizations required)
Other pertinent information: This is a work in progress, which will be an incredibly rich, dynamic, fast paced
and at times overwhelming internship. Not for the faint of heart! But we will have fun, we will laugh a lot, we
will learn a ton and we thank you in advance for being willing to take the leap of faith that is jumping into such
an unknown.
Revised 10/13/11