Our work in child welfare presents many challenges on a daily basis. One of those challenges is that we often work with clients, both parents and youth, who are resistant to collaborating with us to improve the safety and well-being of the youth. This workshop will be focused on how to work with resistant clients by utilizing the connecting principles in the Trust-Based Relational Intervention (TBRI ®) model.

TBRI® is an attachment-based, trauma-informed intervention that is designed to meet the complex needs of vulnerable children. TBRI® uses Empowering Principles to address physical needs, Connecting Principles for attachment needs, and Correcting Principles to disarm fear-based behaviors. While the intervention is based on years of attachment, sensory processing, and neuroscience research, the heartbeat of TBRI® is connection.

We will discuss some of the more common challenges that child welfare professionals face when working with resistant clients and brainstorm strategies to help improve connection and engagement.

Attendees should have a foundational understanding of TBRI and understand attachment theory and where the behaviors come from. Please view this video, or take the TBRI Overview from the Alliance.

Presenter Bio:

Megan Malinoski holds both a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree in social work and has spent the past 13 years of her career with focused on child welfare and helping youth achieve timely permanency. She has worked in many different sectors of child welfare including intercountry adoption, private infant adoption and foster care. In 2020, Megan became a TBRI Practitioner through the Karyn Purvis Institute of Child Development at Texas Christian University. Megan is currently employed at the Department of Children, Youth and Families as a Permanency Consultant. She works hard to ensure that youth spend as little time as possible in foster care and helps prepare caregivers to be a permanent option for youth. She also helps caregivers understand the complex behavioral needs of our children in care utilizing the TBRI model. She is passionate about this model and helping all the people in the life of a youth understand attachment theory and how broken attachments lead to relationship and behavioral challenges.