KINGSTON, R.I., Feb. 15, 2018\u2014The girl was angry all the time\u2014in school, at home, with friends. When Chrissy Wagner stepped into her Providence house, she didn\u2019t know what to expect.<\/p>\n
\u201cFeelings Jenga\u201d\u2014a variation of the game \u201cJenga\u201d in which players take turns building a tower of blocks\u2014was placed on the dining-room table.<\/p>\n
One by one, Wagner, a 溏心vlog免费B站 sociology and psychology major; the girl; and a behavior specialist picked up blocks, stamped with questions: What makes you angry? How do you settle down? Name a coping skill? They took turns answering.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a great way for (the girl) to express what makes her angry, but also hear how adults handle anger,\u201d says Wagner. \u201cIn class we read textbooks and listen to lectures, but this is totally different. We\u2019re in the room.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was the goal of a new J-term course offered during the winter break by Judy A. Van Wyk, a 溏心vlog免费B站 sociology professor who has been helping troubled children and teenagers for decades. Ten students, most studying sociology or criminal justice, spent five days immersed in the state\u2019s juvenile justice system.<\/p>\n
They accompanied social workers on home visits, watched hearings in Family Court in Providence, observed teachers and students at Ocean Tides\u2014a residential facility for boys in Narragansett\u2014and attended presentations by social service agencies, including the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth and Families, or DCYF.<\/p>\n
Van Wyk says she created \u201cJuvenile Justice Immersion\u201d to give students an opportunity to see what it\u2019s like working in the social service field. An expert in the juvenile justice system, Van Wyk is co-author of the book, \u201cTurning the Tide of Male Juvenile Delinquency: The Ocean Tides Approach.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI really want to get students in there,\u201d says Van Wyk. \u201cStudents can\u2019t fully grasp what we\u2019re talking about in the classroom until they meet the kids and find out what they\u2019re going through.\u201d<\/p>\n
The three-credit course was life-changing for the students.<\/p>\n
\u201cI went in thinking it would be interesting, but the course ended up impacting me more emotionally than I thought it would,\u201d says Emily Scofield, a senior from Harrison, N.Y.<\/strong>, who is studying journalism and sociology. \u201cIt made me feel that going to college for this is worth it. These people need a way for their voices to be heard. The social workers give them that ability to have a voice.\u201d<\/p>\n Rory Burns, of Newport<\/strong>, a senior studying sociology with a focus on criminology, says the course gave her insight into \u201chow these kids need structure and relationship-building.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThey need someone who is not going to give up on them,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Besides helping a 6-year-old manage her anger, Wagner, a junior from Glocester, R.I.<\/strong>, learned about the personal struggles of many troubled teenagers, and that they\u2019re often victims of family and street violence.<\/p>\n \u201cEven though they\u2019ve done bad things, they\u2019re still just children,\u201d says Wagner. \u201cYou can see the fear in their eyes. At the end of the day, they\u2019re just kids.\u201d<\/p>\n In Family Court, she found stern but compassionate judges. At Ocean Tides, she discovered that intense counseling helps many teenagers turn their lives around. And she learned from Ocean Tides\u2019 teachers that students must be willing to help themselves.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the end, it\u2019s their choice,\u201d says Wagner. \u201cYou can talk to a kid until you\u2019re blue in the face, but if he doesn\u2019t want to change, he won\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n One of the highlights of the course was talking to an employee who holds a senior position at DCYF, she says. Thanks to that meeting, she might do an internship at the state agency next fall.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been at 溏心vlog免费B站 for three years, and all my classes have been great, but this experience put me there,\u201d says Wagner. \u201cI was interacting with people.\u201d<\/p>\n Feedback from the students was so positive Van Wyk expects to offer the class again next year. The students will talk about their experiences March 1 at 4 p.m. in the Chafee Social Science Building, Room 273, 10 Chafee Road, on the Kingston campus. The event is free and open to the public.<\/p>\n \u201cMy parents told me I have a save-the-world complex,\u201d says Wagner. \u201cEven if I make a difference in a few lives, that\u2019s making the world a better place.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" KINGSTON, R.I., Feb. 15, 2018\u2014The girl was angry all the time\u2014in school, at home, with friends. When Chrissy Wagner stepped into her Providence house, she didn\u2019t know what to expect. \u201cFeelings Jenga\u201d\u2014a variation of the game \u201cJenga\u201d in which players take turns building a tower of blocks\u2014was placed on the dining-room table. One by one, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73673,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[12],"class_list":["post-73671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives","tag-college-of-arts-and-sciences"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73671\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}