- Hi everyone, Steve Adubato.

We kick off the program with Kate Endries, who's National Director of Trauma-Informed Practice at Boys and Girls Clubs of America, and her colleague Susan Haspel, state Director of Boys and Girls Clubs in New Jersey.

Kate and Susan, good to see you.

- Good to see you.

- Thanks for having us.

- Kate, help us on this, and particularly with your background, your professional background in social work and understanding complex issues like trauma.

Define trauma for us first, and then let's talk about what Boys and Girls Clubs in New Jersey, Newark and America are doing to address trauma among countless young men and women.

- Yeah, that's a really great question, Steve.

So trauma is defined as an experience that is perceived as harmful or life threatening to the individual that has experienced it, and so that's gonna look extremely different depending on the person.

So something that is perceived by me as life threatening might be different than something as perceived by you.

And we know that two thirds of young people have experienced at least one traumatic event by the age of 16, and we also know from the ACE study that those childhood adversities and traumatic events correlate to challenges in later life.

And so in order to better serve our young people, we need to work to become trauma-informed in our service delivery model.

- Susan, talk about the role of Boys and Girls Clubs in New Jersey, but also the Newark Clubs.

And, let me disclose, my late grandfather was one of the first directors of the boys, at the time, the Boys Club in Newark, and also I was a member at the Broadway branch which, as you know Susan, does not exist anymore.

- That is true.

- Sadly.

Talk about the role of Boys and Girls Clubs in New Jersey, but particularly Newark as it relates to this trauma informed practice, please.

- Yes, yes.

So we have 22 Boys and Girls Clubs across the state of New Jersey.

- 70,000 young people.

- Serving actually more than 55,000 young people through membership and community outreach.

And every day in New Jersey, more than 200,000 kids have nowhere to go after school.

So the clubs play a critical role in providing a safe place for kids to go and participate in life-changing programs.

The Newark club is actually the leader for the whole Northeast region, in the work that they're doing in the trauma and informed care.

It's just tremendous what they're doing to support their community and the club kids, and the work that's being done there is tremendous.

- Let's be more specific.

By the way, apologize for saying 70,000, it's 55,000 young people.

- Yeah, true.

- But help us on this, Kate, be more specific, what exactly are Boys and Girls Clubs doing to assist these young people dealing with trauma?

- Yeah, so we're working to become a trauma-informed organization at every single one of our Boys and Girls Clubs, and what that looks like is it's a service delivery model that understands that the impact of childhood adversity disrupts development and can lead to later life challenges.

And so it really seeks to look at what are the specific challenges of my community, whether that youth, families or staff that are coming to the clubs and working there, and how can my organization be super responsive to that?

And so it looks like investing in staff development so that we understand signs and symptoms and we're able to be responsive to needs, it looks like building community partnerships to addressing access to important services like mental health services or food or housing services.

So there's a lot of ways that this shows up, and it's gonna be specific to that specific community.

- So Susan, I'm curious about this, in all seriousness, going all the way "back in the day" when I was a member of the Boys Club before it was appropriately Boys and Girls Club.

The issue of mental health, I mean not on the table in the '60s and '70s, who was talking about that?

Susan, help us, why is this the responsibility of Boys and Girls Clubs, A, and, B, where does the funding come from to support these efforts?

- I mean, supporting mental health for youth is more important than ever before and kids are just going through such challenging times, but it's because of partners like Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, and many other supporters in the country, that understand that this is critical now more than ever.

And we know that there are clubs in the state where there are kids that have seen tremendous trauma; homelessness, no parents, I mean there are just so many issues that they're facing and they really need these supports, and our clubs are being trained intensively to provide the resources that they need to have a trusted voice that kids can turn to.

- Horizon Foundation has been a leader in this regard, also lemme disclose, an underwriter of our programming as well.

- Yes.

- But I wanna follow up on something.

So for people who are watching saying, "Well, wait a minute, Boys and Girls Clubs, that's where kids gonna play basketball, some of us learn to swim."

Yeah, that's what they do, they play the after school, keep them out of trouble.

Kate, those things are all true but it's not nearly enough, is it?

- Yeah, kids are showing up their whole selves.

They're showing up with their experiences and their experiences in childhood shape the way that they understand and interact with the world.

In order to do our jobs as Boys and Girls Clubs professionals, and build all the amazing skills we want kids to have, whether that be life and workforce skills or academic success, we need to make sure that they first feel safe.

And in order to feel safe, that means they need to have inclusive and emotionally safe experiences at our Boys and Girls Clubs, which is a core part of the trauma-informed model.

- So Susan first, again, a large part of our audience in suburban communities, "wealthier communities", they often do not have Boys and Girls Clubs.

They just don't, they're disproportionately in urban areas.

Susan, is that fair to say?

- Yes, that is fair to say.

I mean, we have clubs from Jersey City to Atlantic City, all across the state, but in the more affluent communities clubs do not exist.

- So for those watching saying, "Well really, why would you even need that?

I mean, we have all kinds of extracurricular programs after school, on the weekends, there are all kinds of activities that our town supports."

Yes, with a lot of economic support and strength.

That is not the case disproportionately in Black and brown urban communities.

Susan, please talk to that.

- Yes, I mean, absolutely.

I mean, the most important thing that clubs, the biggest priority of our clubs is to provide a safe place where kids can go and have trusted people that they can look up to at the clubs, and there are trained youth development staff at all of our clubs, and now we have trauma informed people at the clubs that are leading the way- - What does that mean?

I'm sorry for interrupting, what does it mean to have trauma informed folks at the clubs who are trained?

trained to do what, see what?

- They're trained, Kate, if you wanna speak to this a little bit more- - Please, Kate.

- Specific training.

- Yeah, so we train all of our staff in the basics of trauma, so why is this related to youth development?

Why is this related to the jobs that they do and practices that they can do to make kids feel included and safe?

And there's three Boys and Girls Clubs in New Jersey specifically that have a certified trauma-informed specialist.

So that person has gone through six months of certification training with the BGCA trauma-informed team, to be able to advise their colleagues and other Boys and Girls Clubs in New Jersey around practices that are gonna create that really emotionally safe and inclusive environment for the young people and the staff, and the families that interact with them.

- Right, and Steve, just- - Go ahead, Susan.

- Sorry.

So the Newark Club, the Garfield Club and the Monmouth County Club all have BGCA trauma informed staff- - What does that mean, the acronym?

- Boys and Girls Clubs of America.

- Okay.

- They've gone through the six months of training and the club in Newark, which is the leader in this space, our Garfield Club and our Monmouth County Club all have people that are trained in this space, that can do training at the local club in the state and in the whole northeast region.

- To Kate and to Susan, thank you so much.

Also, the websites have been up the entire program, both on the state level and the national level of Boys and Girls Clubs.

Please check it out, find out more.

Cannot thank you for the difference that you and your colleagues are making every day.

Thank you, Susan.

Thank you, Kate.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- You got it.

Stay with us, we'll be right back.

- [Narrator] Think Tank with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Celebrating 30 years in public broadcasting.

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