2024 Chief Justice Max Baer Children’s Summit
On March 18-20th 2024, over 450 Judges, Hearing Officers, attorneys and child welfare professionals gathered at the Hershey Lodge in Hershey PA to attend the bi-annual Chief Justice Max Baer Children’s Summit.
The Summit’s goal was to bring cutting-edge information to attendees. Teams from across the Commonwealth, led by their dependency judge and county child welfare administrator, developed strategies to integrate this new information into their local practice.
The Summit theme, “REAL: Renew – Engage – Advocate – Lead,” seemed fitting as these are the actions needed now more than ever!
The highlights of the Summit were:
Renaming the Summit to the Chief Justice Max Baer Children’s Summit in honor of the late Chief Justice’s many contributions to Pennsylvania’s children and families.
Sean Glaze – Building an exceptional workplace culture
The keynote speaker, Sean Glaze, is world-renown as an engaging and powerful catalyst for teams. Sean turns memorable stories and laugh-out-loud interactive moments into relevant lessons that improve productivity while increasing trust.
As a veteran teacher and coach, Sean skillfully entertained and inspired new insights that provided outcomes that can be immediately APPLIED!
John T. Broderick, Jr., – We Can Fix It: My Journey to Discovery on Mental Health
John T. Broderick, Jr. became the Senior Director of External Affairs at Dartmouth-Health in 2017. He was a member of the New Hampshire Supreme Court from 1995 to 2010. During his last seven years there he served as Chief Justice. Much of his focus as Chief Justice was on court reform to make the justice system more accessible, affordable, and understandable.
In 2016 Justice Broderick co-chaired the first statewide launch in New Hampshire of a national mental health awareness campaign called “Change Direction New Hampshire”. His presentation focues on statewide system reform. What it takes to make the “change”. He also discussed the five most common signs of mental illness to improve understanding and awareness of mental illness to eliminate its mythology, encourage discussion and treatment and begin to change the unfair and shameful culture that surrounds it.
Attendees left with a deeper understanding of the topic and what they can do to promote lasting, system reform.
Kenneth Ginsburg – Integrating Self-Care Into Our Real Lives
Dr. Ken Ginsburg is a pediatrician specializing in Adolescent Medicine at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He also serves as Director of Health Services at Covenant House Pennsylvania, an agency that serves Philadelphia’s youth enduring homelessness.
Dr. Ginsburg’s research over the last 30 years has focused on facilitating youth to develop their own solutions to social problems and to teach clinicians how to better serve them. Dr. Ginsburg used his vast knowledge to help integrate self-care into our real lives. He explained how traditional efforts at self-care fractionate us from our lives of service, demonstrating how these self-care practices erroneously suggest ways to remove ourselves from our work. In sharp contrast, Dr. Ginsburg’s presentation emphasized strategies that integrate self-care into our lives of service.
Attendees left with a new understanding of self-care as a mechanism of personal and professional growth!
Jackson Duncan & Zymir Cobb Duncan
The Duncans (father & son) shared their heart-warming experience of tragedy, hope, and love. Before they even knew one another, both father and son had dealt with similar life experiences including childhood trauma and a deep love of sports. When Zymir found himself in the Pennsylvania foster care system at the tender age of 9 years, life was challenging. But when he and Jackson met, the bond grew quickly, and the importance of family was underscored. Attendees were inspired by their life’s story that highlighted the very best in themselves and in the Pennsylvania Child Dependency System.
County Team Time
County Team time focusing on how information provided during the Summit could be integrated into local county practice, thus enhancing the help being provided to children and families.
Handouts
Keynote Speaker Presentations
Building an Exceptional Workplace Culture – 5 Essential Questions for Leaders.
Sean Glaze, Author
Monday, March 18, 2024: 1:45 PM – 3:45 PM
In 2021, Gallup reported that “70% of a team’s engagement is influenced by managers.” And while most managers want to be effective leaders, the problem is they are often unaware of the key elements required to build and sustain an exceptional team culture where people can thrive.
Session participants will learn how five essential questions can help them to identify and improve issues in their workplace culture and ensure that their people are more engaged and productive. This program includes memorable stories and valuable content you will be able to immediately implement to improve retention, boost collaboration, and ignite accountability across your organization.
Sean will equip you to be a more effective leader with the clarity and confidence of a proven, repeatable process you can follow to develop a more positive and high-performing workplace culture.
“We can Fix it: My Journey to Discovery on Mental Health.”
John Broderick, Former Chief Justice New Hampshire Supreme Court
Tuesday, March 19, 2024: 9:15 AM – 10:15 AM
My talk addresses my family’s very public yet very personal journey into the valley of mental illness while I was a member of the New Hampshire Supreme Court and our emergence from trials and challenges I wouldn’t wish on another living soul. But we emerged whole, loving and impatient for change. Those experiences, replete with my own ignorance and mistakes, redirected my life.
For the last eight years I have traveled over 100,000 miles in my black Jeep all over New England talking to tens of thousands of kids grades 6-12 in over 360 middle school and high school gyms and auditoriums about mental health awareness. But, more importantly, over that time I have hugged more kids with wet eyes and cracking voices than I could ever have imagined. Kids have also shared how they’re doing and hurting in several thousand confided conversations following my remarks. I have come to know, and love, this generation but I also know that they suffer from epidemic levels of anxiety and depression.
We are not helpless and can fix much of what I have seen and hugged if we want. Or we can just kick the can down the road as we have done so blindly for generations. Change and real progress are within our grasp but only if we are smart enough, strong enough and impatient enough to grasp them.
Integrating Self-Care Into Our Real Lives.
Kenneth Ginsburg
Tuesday, March 19, 2024: 12:45 PM – 2:30 PM
If we are to make a difference in the lives of the families, children, and youth that we serve, we must foster the kind of connections that position us as a positive force in their lives. Although a strength-based model helps us witness compassion and resilience amidst the suffering, our deeper engagement leaves us vulnerable as we bear witness to the uncertainties of the human condition. This vulnerability, if not properly managed, can lead to maladaptive coping strategies that distance us from our emotions and from those very people we aim to serve. This detachment, a state called “burnout,” will limit our effectiveness and decrease our job satisfaction.
Too many efforts at self-care fractionate us from our lives of service. They tell us what we should do for ourselves and suggest ways to remove ourselves from our work. In sharp contrast, this talk is about integrating self-care into our lives of service.
The Journey to Being a Part of Something Bigger Than Yourself.
Jackson Duncan & Zymir Cobbs-Duncan
Wednesday, March 20, 2024: 9:15 AM – 10:00 AM
In life, it only takes one person to show a child that it’s possible to turn a tough situation into a great life story. Could you be that person?
As a young man, I had to overcome my own adversities and childhood trauma. Like many young men in high school and college, I put my energy towards athletics to release my anger and frustrations. After college, I moved to Philadelphia. I had a strong calling to provide mentorship to the young men I saw on the streets who, like me, seemed to be trying to distract their own struggles by putting their energy into various athletics. Having tragically lost my own father, I also understood the importance of a father figure in your life. Through these observations and passion, I created Focused Athletics to support the academic and athletic potential of young athletes in the Philadelphia area trying to overcome their own adversities. It was here that I learned the power of a supportive community. It was here that I became a mentor and father to my son, Zymir. And, it was here that our journey to being part of something bigger began.