Aliah Wright:
From the National Association of Social Workers, I'm Aaliyah Wright, and this is Social Work Talks. Thank you so much for joining us for this episode. Today, we're discussing school social work from the perspective of Charm Town author and NASW member Brenda Wade. A Maryland-born and raised crime fiction novelist, Wade, who writes under the pen name Hunter William, is also a 20-year advocate for children and families. Working with children presents its own set of rewards and unique challenges, as witnessed by Peyton Stanfield, the main character in Wade's fictional crime series, Charm Town. Brenda, thank you so much for joining us.
Brenda Wade:
Thank you. It's great to be here.
Aliah Wright:
Can you tell us a little about your background, how long you've been a social worker, and what drew you to social work and to writing?
Brenda Wade:
I've been a social worker for a little over 20 years now. I absolutely love being a social worker. It's been the best professional decision that I could have made. I have had the unique opportunity to work in different settings and work with different populations and see people get to places where they want to be where they weren't necessarily in the beginning. I just love having the opportunity to impact other people's lives.
Aliah Wright:
And what drew you to writing?
Brenda Wade:
So, I started writing when I was a teenager in high school and I started with just a journal. I had a journal, and I just would be in my room because I was the only girl in my family. My brothers would be outside playing. And I used to love to read, and I would read mystery novels all the time, so I read all the Nancy Drew series and the Alfred Hitchcock and Hardy Boys. And I was just really always interested in mystery, and I would always jot down sort of what I was feeling on a particular day or if something had happened in my life and just kind of a way to express my thoughts and put things down. And so I found that I was interested in that and I carried that through in college. I started writing short stories. Never shared that with anyone, just kept my little journal and continued through when I was in graduate school. Just doing short stories, and I've always just done them over the years. It wasn't until probably about almost 10 years ago now that a friend of mine, who's also a writer, suggested that I think about publishing. I wrote professionally, prior, for a nonprofit organizations. I was writing funding grants and proposals and things like that, but my love was really in writing fiction.
Aliah Wright:
Did you always see yourself having a career in schools working with students?
Brenda Wade:
I knew I wanted to work with young people. I wasn't quite sure in what setting, initially, although one of my first jobs actually in working what I would call with individuals was at a school here in Washington DC called the Kingsbury Center. That is a school, but it's also an organization that does a lot of psychological testing and evaluations for young people who have disabilities. And so I really liked the school part. I was interested in that side of things. Then, when I graduated from Howard University — I received my Master's of Social Work degree there — I was accepted into a postgraduate clinical fellowship at the Yale University School of Medicine at their child study center, and I chose children and family. I was placed in schools as part of my externship there and that's where the interest really sparked. And I knew I wanted to work in the school setting.
Aliah Wright:
And the rest, as they say, is history?
Brenda Wade:
And the rest, they say, is history.
Aliah Wright:
Now, tell us a little bit about each of your books in this series and where people can find them.
Brenda Wade:
Well, first you can find the books on Amazon. You can also go to my website, which is www.authorhunterwilliam.com. There's no S at the end. It's hunterwilliam.com, and also on Barnes and Noble. The series will be three. There will be three books in the series and then a spinoff to the series. Books one and two are out. Book three is due out early next year. Fingers crossed. It is a story about what happens to young people in urban school settings. And I chose to do my first project in the school setting, because I've been very familiar with working in schools and I'm very familiar with young people. But I also wanted to tell the story of the young people who go to school in urban settings and what their individual circumstances are like, what their lives are like, why they make the choices and decisions that they make and what goes on for them that leads them to some of the places where they ultimately end up, which aren't necessarily always positive. All three books cover the course of one school year, and so it's just a story about what happens. It encompasses the students, and the teachers, and the parents, and the community, the school secretary, the custodian, the bus driver. So, everyone who comes in contact with young people in the school setting is encompassed in the story. Of course, the main character is a social worker.
Aliah Wright:
Right. That's the other thing I was getting to is the main character is Peyton Stanfield. She's the social work. She's the one that's going through, so we're seeing the story through her lens.
Brenda Wade:
Yes.
Aliah Wright:
Yes. How much of that part of the books are drawn on real life experiences?
Brenda Wade:
Well, it definitely has informed my writing for this series, I must say. And it's really just a compilation of just over 20 years of working in schools and with young people and just knowing about instances and things that have happened in schools, whether it be something that I knew about specifically or just knew of. And so there are sort of general themes with young people around dealing with the issues that they deal with. That might be family-based. They might be community-based, whether it's learning deficits. So, it's really easy to kind of develop stories around those kind of central themes that I see happen with young people. Unfortunately, exposure to violence and just poverty, the effects of being exposed to communities that are high-poverty communities and what that does to the young people and their ability to access their curriculum in a school setting and even getting to school to even be able to access their curriculum.
Aliah Wright:
Children today are faced with a number of challenges from the drug epidemic sweeping the country to issues surrounding school safety and violence. What are some other challenges school social workers face in helping their clients?
Brenda Wade:
Resources, so just having the resources to be able to provide what we feel like our students need. A lot of schools in urban settings have very small funding streams, if you will, so it's very difficult to maybe access things such as therapeutic materials or books or anything of those natures to kind of help our young people with whatever it is that they may deal with. We may have group counseling sessions or even if it's individual sessions. Sometimes, school social workers run after school programs. We're all over the building. We're wearing lots of different hats, doing lots of different tasks. And sometimes, it's very difficult to get hold of the items that you may need to be able to effectively implement a program.
Aliah Wright:
Recently, there has been a movement to employ more social workers and other mental health professionals in schools as an alternative to arm school resource officers. What's your take on that?
Brenda Wade:
This is just sort of something that we've been pushing for in the industry for probably as long as I've been in the industry, if not longer, and there's never enough. I mean, you could never have enough mental health professionals in the building, which sadly is indicative of what our young people are facing today. I'm certainly not an advocate of having armed school resource officers in the building. I think that I'd rather err on the side of being proactive as opposed to being reactive and putting those services and programs in place for our young people in their families to help them to deal with the challenges that they face before it gets to the point where someone is feeling like they have to resort to an action such as harming themselves or others.
Aliah Wright:
Would you say that working as a school social worker is a balancing act, what with trying to keep the best interest of children who may be at risk at heart, working with parents as well as collaborating with other professionals?
Brenda Wade:
I do think it's a balancing act. I don't know that I necessarily think that it's a balancing act in trying to keep the best interest of the children and working with the parents and collaborating with other professionals. Collaborating with other professionals is actually one of my favorite parts of working in schools, because generally schools not only have social workers, but they may have psychologists, and there are other mental health professionals. Some schools even have child psychiatrists that come onsite and work with our young people. I've been in schools where local universities have had mental health services and clinics within the school setting. And so, that's always worked out very well in terms of collaborating together and develop, whether it's developing treatment plans or working with families and students. Working with parents is always great. I think that parents sometimes are not given the, I would say, the due that they should be given. Sometimes, parents are seen as not necessarily interested in being actively involved in their child's lives. I always caution people not to sort of have that opinion about our parents. I've never met a parent who doesn't care about their child, but I have met a parent who has outside psychosocial factors that greatly impact their ability to provide or give for their children what they want at that time.
Aliah Wright:
What do you see as the main role of a school social worker? Is it developing a positive school climate, reporting abuse and neglect, or talking to disgruntled parents? All of the above?
Brenda Wade:
Yeah. All of the above and a few more things. It kind of depends on where you are. So for example, in Baltimore City, the main role of school social workers is to provide services to students with disabilities.
Aliah Wright:
Really?
Brenda Wade:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). That is not the case in every school district.
Aliah Wright:
I think that's a really good point. It's relative.
Brenda Wade:
It is, you know, and it gets ... It's not understood. Sometimes, people will just assume, "Okay, so you have social workers in your building and so they're just here to service everybody." They may not necessarily be a child that has been found to have a disability. We have general education students who are in the building who exhibit issues and concerns and challenges and all of that. But in some of the buildings, a school social worker's role is to work strictly with that population.
Aliah Wright:
So does that mean you don't help those kids who may have other issues or do you refer them to someone else?
Brenda Wade:
No, it doesn't necessarily mean that you don't. You can refer them someplace else. There are also what we term as general social workers in a building who work specifically with the general education population. But in most cases, sometimes, it is a referral out. Well, what I will say is that typically, as school social workers, we enter in a building. First thing you want to do is kind of connect with the administration in the building. You know, the principals or head of schools or whoever it is, and just get an idea for what is it that they're looking for their school social worker, the type of role they would like for their school social worker to have in their building. Granted, we also bring with us ideas of these are some of the things that we think you may want to focus on, whether it be mental health awareness. It could be issues around grief and loss. You know, it could be issues around trauma, children exposed to trauma and what sort of services and programs we could provide for that. That's where it becomes almost like a collaboration, because you really should sit down with your principal in your building, conduct a needs assessment, find out what they think are or what's what's needed in your building with your students. And then from there, determine what programs and services would be most applicable.
Aliah Wright:
Do you think school social workers face more unique challenges depending on where they work? And are the challenges different depending on the age of the child?
Brenda Wade:
I do think that school social workers face unique challenges if you're working in an urban setting. And I would say probably there are unique challenges in suburban settings, but let's not forget there are also unique challenges in rural settings. I know that, sometimes, we don't always have that conversation about rural settings and young people that live in rural settings and also on Indian reservations, Native Americans. There's lots of different populations that school social workers work with, but absolutely unique challenges in every one of those settings.
Aliah Wright:
Now, what kind of advice would you give a young person who may be considering a degree in the field of social work?
Brenda Wade:
I would say talk to professionals in the field. Get as much information as possible. Do your homework, you know? Just investigate schools of social work, read what their focus areas are. If you know that you're interested in maybe working in a hospital setting, maybe volunteering at a hospital or are asking to go and shadow a social worker in whatever industry that you're interested in working in. And one other thing I'd like to say is social workers are across the board in different industries. We're in corporate America. You know, we're not just in human services. We're not just in child protective services. Social workers just don't take children from their parents, you know. We provide the majority of the mental health services in this country. And so I think that usually when I talk to young people who are interested in pursuing or thinking, "Oh, I think I may want to think about social work," it's very one dimensional for them. So, I really encourage them to go out and talk to people and find out what they're doing. And if they study, you can do policy. There's macro social work, as we know. There's micro social work. It's so many areas that you could find yourself. I encourage them to go out and do their homework.
Aliah Wright:
Those are all really good tips. When you're helping children cope with traumatic events, how do you manage self care?
Brenda Wade:
I write.
Aliah Wright:
Okay. It all goes back to the writing.
Brenda Wade:
It all goes back to the writing. Yeah.
Aliah Wright:
What do you find rewarding?
Brenda Wade:
About social work?
Aliah Wright:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Brenda Wade:
Being able to empower another person, another human being, to get to that place where they feel good about being able to make a choice and decision for themselves. I think the most rewarding has been when a young person comes back after maybe five or even 10 years of you working with them and saying, "Thank you," or, "I'm so glad you pushed me in this area. I'm so glad you encouraged me to do this or you encouraged me to do that." That's probably the ultimate reward.
Aliah Wright:
Brenda, what do you hope readers ultimately take away from the Charm Town series?
Brenda Wade:
I think what I want them to understand is that education in America looks different in different places. It looks different for different kids. And so I think that I'd like for people to understand that no matter what zip code a young person or a kid lives in, that that they all want the same things. They all want to be able to come to school, to be free to access their education, to sit in a classroom where they don't have to worry about what happened at home last night, if the lights are on, if my clothing and my furniture is going to be on the curb when I come home, if my mom is going to have enough resources or enough money to feed us or purchase clothing, that they can just come into the classroom and be able and have the ability to just kind of sit there and take the lesson that the teacher is providing them in the class and not be burdened with those stressors. And I also want people to understand that kids are kids no matter where they grow up, you know? No matter what they look like — and suburban, urban, whatever, you know — every kid wants to be loved. You know, every kid wants to be valued and every kid wants to learn. You know? That's probably the biggest takeaway. and that there are differences, and that kids that go to school in urban settings sometimes are asked to achieve and compete at the same level where kids that may go to school in more affluent school districts.
Aliah Wright:
The character of Peyton Stanfield is very complex. She's a single woman. She's dating another character who's married. The social work part of the book is threaded through her tale of what she's encountering. So, I want you to talk a little bit about Peyton.
Brenda Wade:
Peyton Stanfield is a fun girl. You know, she loves being a social worker and she comes to Montebello, and she finds that she really enjoys working with the young people there. But she encounters Hamilton Banks. And from there, this relationship just takes off at lightning speed. And woven in the story is what happens with that relationship and then how that relationship impacts the work that she does at the school. What I was trying to demonstrate is that, you know, social workers, we're people, too. You know, and we have imperfect lives just like everyone else. Sometimes, we're faced with making choices and decisions that may not necessarily be the best choice or decision that we should make for us ourselves and how that plays out in the work that we do and how she tries to balance that.
Aliah Wright:
And who's your favorite character in the book?
Brenda Wade:
My favorite character in the book is Jared, because he is a young person who is super smart. I mean, intellectually, he is scoring off the charts. But because of his personal situation, he hardly comes to school. When he does come to school, he's quite disruptive. He's not really able to ... he's not accessing his education at all. He gets into a situation where he's clearly in over his head. And he has developed a very close relationship with Gina, who's an assistant principal in the building. But what I like about Jared is that he knows that he's a smart kid. He has made some choices that are not the best choices and decisions that he could've made for himself. But he still comes back to the school, because he knows that I can rise above this. I can do better. And he comes back each time, and he's looking for the support, which is what our young people do. You know, they come in and they tell us these stories about what happened last night or what happened last week. But I'm here today, and I'm sitting in this classroom, and I'm going to try to get this work because as Jared says, I'm going to try to get into this college that you want me to go to. And that's what he says to Gina in a conversation that they're having. So, I love telling his story, because so many young people, that's their story, of Jared. And sometimes those kids are written of as whatever. And really, they're not. I mean, they're some of the smartest kids I've ever met, you know, who just have been put in unfortunate circumstances. So when I am talking about the story in Charm Town, and it's intentional, is that it's not just specific to one urban city in America. There are people who have read this book that are all over the country and they think that this is exactly what's going on where I work. A lot of times, a school social worker in the building, we're not just necessarily attending meetings. But we really are right there, one-on-one with a young person that may have a very hard decision that they have to make or something that they've done and they're not sure what they should do next. So when the Freddie Gray incident happened in Baltimore City, I was writing the first novel. I was looking at the news and watching all of the cable news channels. And everybody was in Baltimore and they were interviewing community activists and some young people. But it just seemed like the overriding sentiment about the young people was that, "Oh, they're, you know, running out of the school building, and the kids here don't want to learn," and all of these negative kind of connotations I felt were attributed to all the kids in Baltimore City. And I thought, "Wow."
Aliah Wright:
And remind our listeners about Freddie Gray.
Brenda Wade:
Oh, I'm sorry. Freddie Gray was an incident that happened in Baltimore City, where he was arrested by Baltimore City police officers and he was placed in their wagon. Something happened where he was severely injured, and he ultimately died from his injuries. And so it was a huge case in Baltimore City. There were charges brought forth on the police officers. And no one, in the end, ultimately ended up serving any time. There's a whole story behind all of that, but that's basically the gist to the Freddie Gray situation.
Brenda Wade:
But out of that did come police reform. We have a wonderful state's attorney, Marilyn Mosby, there, who really stepped up and took the forefront in bringing charges and really talking about the need for police reform and lots of things has happened for the city under her reign in terms of reforming police and the way we go about policing and kind of the way we think about policing. And I do know that in the area where Freddie Gray lived and where he grew up, different grant programs have happened in that area. Thankfully, some positives have come out of that very sad and unfortunate incident. But we still have a long way to go. And so as I was writing this story, I thought to myself, "Wow. You know, if I didn't work with these kids ..." I have friends who don't work in school settings, you know, who just are watching TV and they think, "Wow, you know? Is that really what it's like?" And we might have conversations, and I say to them, "No. There are wonderful kids that go to this school or wonderful kids that go to that school, and people just need to hear their stories." So, I wanted to tell a story where I'm specifically telling the individual story of a young person. And so you, as the reader, can get a better understanding of, "Wow. I can see if that person, a young person, had to deal with all of that, why it might be kind of hard, that it's difficult for me to just get to school, let alone anything further."
Aliah Wright:
Any additional thoughts?
Brenda Wade:
I really want people to understand that these young people are individuals and they have individual stories. And some of their stories are gripping. Some of their stories are not the best stories that you could hear, and they're put in instances in places unimaginable, certainly to me and my childhood. And yet, they still get up every day, and they still come in, and they still want someone to be there and tell them you know what, to be their champion, that it's going to be okay. You know? That you just keep moving forward and there will be people there to support you and hold you up.
Aliah Wright:
Brenda, thank you so much for taking the time to speak to us today. And thank you, listeners, for taking the time to join us. Be sure and check out show notes for resources. Until next time.
Announcer:
You have been listening to NASW Social Work Talks, a production of the National Association of Social Workers. We encourage you to visit NASW's website for more information about our efforts to enhance the professional growth and development of our members, to create and maintain professional standards, and to advance sound social policies. You can learn more at www.socialworkers.org. Don't forget to subscribe to NASW Social Work Talks wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks again for joining us. We look forward to seeing you next episode.