![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.spcc-roch.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/img_2757.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
When SPCC\u2019s Clinical Director and my supervisor and mentor, Sarah Fitzgibbons, asked me to co-facilitate our agency\u2019s first year-long Reflective Supervision Learning Collaborative with her, I responded as I most always do when a new exciting idea comes my way\u2014with an enthusiastic, \u201cyes!\u201d\u00a0 This of course was promptly followed by perhaps a more measured and honest internal reaction of, \u201cwhat in the world does she think I would have to contribute?!\u201d<\/p>\n
Before I share more, allow me to lay out some foundation:<\/p>\n
Rebecca Shamoon-Shanok (2016) describes Reflective Supervision as \u201c\u2026 a relationship for learning.\u00a0 The partnership nurtures a process of remembering, reviewing, and thinking out loud about a specific child, the people who surround that child, and what happens (or doesn\u2019t) between them\u2026it could be said that reflective supervision enhances vision, clarifying what is seen and even what is see-able.\u00a0 In a real sense, the effect of reflective supervision is that it nourishes \u201csupervision\u201d\u2014the ability to see further, deeper and more.\u201d<\/p>\n
Through research and experience in the field of Infant Mental Health, we know that working with infants, young children and their families is difficult work that ignites complex and sometimes buried feelings in us all.\u00a0 To do this work, and do it well, we must be supported through skillful and experienced Reflective Supervisors.\u00a0 In addition to Reflective Supervision supporting infant and young child outcomes through the provision of quality, nuanced and relational services, it retains employees, reduces vicarious trauma and burnout, and increases staff satisfaction.\u00a0 Many models in our community require Reflective Supervision (NYS Association for Infant Mental Health Endorsement, Nurse Family Partnership, Child-Parent Psychotherapy, Parents as Teachers), but our community\u2019s roster of leaders and supervisors practicing Reflective Supervision, as it is defined by the field of Infant Mental Health, does not support the tremendous need.<\/p>\n
Here’s where the conception of SPCC\u2019s Reflective Supervision Learning Collaborative comes in.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been practicing Reflective Supervision for about 4 years now.\u00a0 Practicing receiving it\u2026.practicing providing it\u2026 I\u2019ll point out that the use of the word \u2018practice\u2019 is intentional.<\/p>\n
As a receiver of Reflective Supervision, I practice taking risks in what I share in the space that Sarah has created.\u00a0 Sometimes I feel clunky and tangled, unsure if the content or emotion coming to the surface belongs or is allowed.\u00a0 Sometimes I feel confident and proud and need Sarah to bear witness to growth I have found.\u00a0 At times Sarah and I together practice being in harmony, as well as in conflict; then comes the tricky work of figuring out how to repair our relationship.<\/p>\n
As a provider of Reflective Supervision, I practice holding space and silence; I struggle with the internal turmoil of content that my supervisees share that poke at my innermost ghosts<\/a>.\u00a0 I practice being authentic and honest while maintaining care and warmth.\u00a0 I rehearse, again and again, balancing the emotional and relational content that is expressed to me, while holding questions about the infants, children, and families being served.\u00a0 I wonder about racial inequity and structural racism and further wonder what I\u2019m not able or willing to see because of the intersection of my privilege.\u00a0 I practice weaving the roles of reflectively supervising while maintaining best practice and quality assurance of service; of holding up the mirror to a supervisee in the sometimes impatient hope that they will be able to do the same for their clients.<\/p>\n But to practice vulnerably, in front of 10 multi-disciplinary leaders in our community for this year-long endeavor poked at the question, which so often gets provoked in me when my confidence is wavering; Am I good enough?<\/p>\n In planning for the Learning Collaborative, Sarah and I fumbled, found our way, and fumbled again as we decided how to lead this group.\u00a0 Sarah tapped into her resources and connected with colleagues and experts across the country; we combed through books and literature and reflected on our own experiences and ways of knowing; we moved 47 post-it notes with key ideas back and forth into different categories, and threw them away… before ultimately retrieving them from the trash and smoothing them back out. \u00a0We held proverbial mirrors up to each other and struggled to stay steadfast in an idea central to the parallel process of Reflective Supervision, that our way of being \u2018teaches\u2019 far more than any words put at the front of the room.\u00a0 What will this be like for participants? How much content do we share? How much space should we leave? Will the relationships necessary to do this work be formed? \u00a0And the question I just can\u2019t seem to escape, \u201cWill I be good enough?\u201d Our questions and wonderings seemed to mostly lead to more curiosity, which I think we came to embrace and trust. We started to craft the story, without knowing the plot twists or ending; we decided to honor the practice of Reflective Supervision and embrace not knowing and trust the process.<\/p>\n Finally, in November 2017, 10 supervisors and leaders of agencies serving children 0-6, and 2 hopeful, yet unsure facilitators gathered for the first time.\u00a0 Throughout our 12 months the group surprised Sarah & me again and again.\u00a0 Each month a little more vulnerability was shown, risks were taken, connections were made, trust was demonstrated\u2014questions that we didn\u2019t know needed asking were raised, struggles were shared and successes were celebrated.\u00a0 How was it that these people we were supposed to be training, were teaching us so much?<\/p>\n On our final day, in October 2018, we gathered together one last time.\u00a0 Each participant was asked to bring something to the group that symbolized their experience.\u00a0 Some brought tokens that they passed out to each member, some brought photos or objects that represented the woods through which we all walked.\u00a0 As the clich\u00e9 goes, we laughed, we cried, and we reflected on what we all gleaned.\u00a0 In our final few moments, one of our remarkable group members gifted us with the following poem she authored:<\/p>\n Reflection<\/p>\n You bring me their story And Kath was right.\u00a0 We did find clarity at the end of this story\u2014clarity that, while I\u2019m not sure we realized it at the beginning, it was essential for part of the journey to consist of broken and shattered pieces.\u00a0 The process of this Learning Collaborative had to mirror what we ultimately hope those we supervise can offer to the infants and children they work on behalf of and with: joining with families in pain and being willing to see the jagged edges, while concurrently being able to see the larger and larger reflection that appears as we piece the fragments back together.\u00a0 The incredible members of this Learning Collaborative also taught me that \u201cbeing good enough\u201d as a leader and provider of Reflective Supervision isn\u2019t necessarily about having the answers, but is more about being authentically curious enough to ask the questions.<\/p>\n I\u2019m so grateful that this remarkable group gave me yet again, another opportunity to practice.\u00a0 So I think, perhaps, that the story has just begun\u2026<\/p>\n A Year of Practice: The Story That Has No End<\/p>\n Author, Alana Russotti, reflects on the trepidation and ultimate gratitude of one of her additional roles as co-facilitator of SPCC\u2019s first Reflective Supervision Learning Collaborative.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":17218,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[49,42,170,48,175],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-infant-mental-health","category-passions","category-programs","category-reflective-supervision","category-tvp"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.spcc-roch.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/img_1391-300x300.jpg\")
<\/p>\n\n
\nA thousand pieces of broken mirror
\nEach word
\nEach emotion
\nCuts our soul as we put the mirror back together
\nWe now see the family more clearly in the mirror
\nWe now see ourselves more clearly in the mirror
\nThe story is not over
\nBut the mirror is whole…for today<\/p>\n-Kathleen Howard-Schoeberl, 2018<\/h5>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\nTo learn more about training provided by SPCC, please visit
\nwww.spcc-roch.org\/trainings<\/a><\/h3>\n
\nOur profound gratitude to the smart, vulnerable and brave members of our
\nfirst learning collaborative:<\/h3>\nStephanie Brown
\nSt. John Fisher College<\/h4>\nJessica Diabo
\nEarly Intervention<\/h4>\nLeah Elliot
\nSPCC<\/h4>\nBarb Higgins
\nHead Start\/Early Head Start<\/h4>\nKathleen Howard-Schoeberl
\nNurse Family Partnership<\/h4>\nClarice Lazary
\nSPCC<\/h4>\nKenya Malcolm
\nUniversity of Rochester<\/h4>\nAlice McAdam
\nHillside<\/h4>\nDanielle Nicholson
\nSPCC<\/h4>\nLynn White
\nMonroe County Department of Human Services<\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"