Assignment Task
Scenario: KAMA Community Services (KCS)
You are working for a not-for-profit organisation called KAMA Community Services. As an integral part of the KAMA team, you will provide a range of services for the needs of young people in the community. As an organisation, we work closely with and advocate for young people, ensuring their needs are identified and addressed with the utmost sensitivity and effectiveness.
At KAMA, we believe in fostering an environment where young individuals feel heard, valued, and understood. Through the two (2) observational tasks in this assessment, you’ll be simulating real-life scenarios where the needs of young people might evolve. By immersing yourself in these situations, either in an actual youth work environment or via role plays, you’ll be showcasing your ability to identify needs, respond proactively, and advocate for the best interests of those you work with. Remember, this task lies in not just the methodology but the ethics and genuine care with which you approach each young individual.
Task A
During this assessment you must demonstrate your knowledge in the following areas:
Identify and Respond to the Needs of Young Person 1
- Information Provision and Documentation
- Provide the young person, their family, or carer with tailored information.
- Role-play this provision and then document the type of information you provided.
Engagement and Listening Skills
- Engage in a role-play discussion with the young person.
- Demonstrate active listening to their issues, concerns, and feelings, and record key points from the conversation.
Monitoring and Emotional Response Management
- During the role play, identify any urgent needs the young person has, explain your approach to prioritising these needs, and document your observations.
- Demonstrate and record how you manage communication effectiveness and emotional responses, including interventions to offer calm and reassurance.
Functional Impairment Assessment
- Observe and role-play how to identify signs of functional impairment and note the dynamics of their relationships, recording specific behaviours and interactions.
- Reflect on and document potential support strategies.
Goal Setting and Advocacy Negotiation
- Assist the young person in setting goals. Document the process and any agreements on actions to achieve these goals.
- Represent the young person’s interests, ensuring they understand the process and confirming the scope of advocacy agreed upon.
Service Discussion and Referral Process
- Discuss available services, legal provisions, and resources with the young person, checking their understanding, and demonstrate the referral process using the Referral Template provided.
Accompaniment and Representation
- Simulate accompanying the young person to services, document the process, and later role-play how to represent their interests accurately.
- Confirm with the ‘young person’ that they understand each step taken on their behalf.
Advocacy Reporting
- Following the role-play activities, complete a detailed report on your advocacy activities, including all steps taken from providing information to representing the young person’s interests.
- In the role play, ensure you maintain a professional demeanour, show empathy, and reflect on each interaction for learning and documentation purposes.
- This will provide a comprehensive demonstration of competency in engaging with and advocating for a young person.
Case study
Read the case study and demonstrate in your role play your knowledge and understanding of the above requirements.
Participant 1
- Marcus (Youth seeking support)
Introduction to the Case Study
Marcus is a 17-year-old male facing academic challenges and experiencing social isolation. He lives with his grandmother after losing both parents at a young age. You are the Youth Support Officer who specialises in youth support at KAMA Community Services.
Background Information
You meet with Marcus and his grandmother at the KAMA Community Services Centre. You provide a range of information on youth counselling, academic support groups, and community clubs to foster social connections for Marcus in the community in which they reside.
Marcus’s Profile (Person role-playing the youth in this case study)
Marcus was born in a small town on the outskirts of a bustling city. He’s the only child of his parents who tragically passed away in a car accident when he was just 10 years old. Following the accident, he moved in with his grandmother, Mrs. Eleanor Rose, who had retired from her job as a librarian.
Marcus attends the local public school. He used to be an above-average student, keen on science and art. However, after the loss of his parents, his academic performance declined. He became more introverted and struggled to maintain friendships. His peers who were very aware of his loss, often tiptoed around him, unsure of how to engage with him. He became known as being very ‘quiet’ in the class.
Before the accident, Marcus loved outdoor activities and was very connected to his dad who engaged in sports with him. He was part of the local under 10s soccer team and had loved skateboarding which was an activity again that he shared with his dad. Since their passing, though, he was more inclined to do indoor activities. He spends hours online gaming, which his grandmother doesn’t understand, and it causes tension between them.
Marcus grapples with episodes of anxiety, particularly during anniversaries or events that remind him of his parents. Nightmares are frequent, but he tries to mask his feelings, not wanting to burden his already worried and aging grandmother. Despite him trying to hide his feelings and appear to be calm, he experiences feelings of loneliness, sadness, and occasionally anger towards the unfairness of life.
He has one close friend, Joshua. He and Joshua formed a great friendship from his younger soccer team days. However, Joshua moved to another school last year, and whilst they try to keep in touch through online gaming, the frequency has definitely reduced. Marcus often feels out of place during school social events and prefers the comfort of home. Marcus wishes that he could find new hobbies and meet new friends socially, but he is shy and reserved when it comes to putting himself out there.
Marcus feels the pressure of upcoming university applications or what to do next after high school finishes. He’s aware that his grades aren’t what they need to be, and he feels the need to find a job, although his grandmother would like him to go to university as she believes that’s what his parents would have wanted for him. But his internal struggles and social anxieties make it challenging to make decisions about his future. He’s also worried about leaving his aging grandmother alone if he goes to a university in a different city.
Participant 2
- You are the Youth Officer at KAMA Community Services
As the Student undertaking the role as the Youth Support Officer in this case study, you are required to demonstrate support in the following areas with Marcus.
Your Profile
As the Youth Support Officer at KAMA, you must ensure that Marcus and his grandmother receive essential information on available support services. You will be required to demonstrate the following during your discussion with Marcus.
- Actively listen to his feelings, concerns, and issues. Document the significant insights from the conversation.
- Collaboratively with Marcus, establish clear, actionable goals. Maintain a written record of these goals and the strategies to achieve them.
- Identify suitable services that Marcus can access and actively motivate him to utilise these services.
- Where necessary, make formal referrals to alternate services for Marcus in the community. Complete the provided Referral Template detailing these referrals.
- Your role advocates for Marcus’s interests. Negotiate the objectives, your role, and the scope of the advocacy required for Marcus. All agreed details will be documented.
- During the early stages of your interaction, accompany Marcus to specific engagements, observing and documenting any observations about his interactions and responses.
- Part of your role is to represent Marcus’s interests in various settings. Ensure that Marcus is continuously informed about these representation processes and how they benefit him.
- At the conclusion, compile a comprehensive report, detailing all advocacy activities related to Marcus’s case.
Task B
During this assessment you must demonstrate your knowledge in the following areas:
Identify and Respond to the Needs of Young Person 2
Information Provision and Documentation
- Provide the young person, their family, or carer with tailored information.
- Role-play this provision and then document the type of information you provided.
Engagement and Listening Skills
- Engage in a role-play discussion with the young person.
- Demonstrate active listening to their issues, concerns, and feelings, and record key points from the conversation.
Monitoring and Emotional Response Management
- During the role play, identify any urgent needs the young person has, explain your approach to prioritising these needs, and document your observations.
- Demonstrate and record how you manage communication effectiveness and emotional responses, including interventions to offer calm and reassurance.
Functional Impairment Assessment
- Observe and role-play how to identify signs of functional impairment and note the dynamics of their relationships, recording specific behaviours and interactions.
- Reflect on and document potential support strategies.
Goal Setting and Advocacy Negotiation
- Assist the young person in setting goals. Document the process and any agreements on actions to achieve these goals.
- Represent the young person’s interests, ensuring they understand the process and confirming the scope of advocacy agreed upon.
Service Discussion and Referral Process
- Discuss available services, legal provisions, and resources with the young person, checking their understanding, and demonstrate the referral process using the Referral Template provided.
Accompaniment and Representation
- Simulate accompanying the young person to services, document the process, and later role-play how to represent their interests accurately.
- Confirm with the ‘young person’ that they understand each step taken on their behalf.
Advocacy Reporting
- Following the role-play activities, complete a detailed report on your advocacy activities, including all steps taken from providing information to representing the young person’s interests.
- In the role play, ensure you maintain a professional demeanour, show empathy, and reflect on each interaction for learning and documentation purposes.
- This will provide a comprehensive demonstration of competency in engaging with and advocating for a young person.
Case study 2
Read the case study and demonstrate in your role play your knowledge and understanding of the above requirements.
Participant 1
- Keira (Youth seeking support)
Introduction to the Case Study
Keira is a 16-year-old high school student known for being bubbly and funny. She is involved in a range of school social circles and is well liked due to her warm and caring personality. Beneath her cheerful exterior, however, Keira harbours a distressing secret that is really affecting her mental and emotional well-being.
Keira’s Profile [Person role-playing the youth in this case study]
Keira lives in a mid-sized city with her mother, Naomi, and her stepfather, Stephen. Naomi and Keira have always been close, but the dynamics of their relationship have changed since Stephen entered their lives. Naomi who is a nurse and works a lot of shift work, sees Stephen as a stabilising force in the home, overlooking certain red flags in his behaviour. Keira’s biological father Joe lives in another town as a miner but remains an important figure in her life. Due to her dad’s job, Keira and Joe don’t see as much of each other as they would like.
Keira has been facing physical and emotional abuse from Stephen. These incidents often occur when Naomi is at work, making it easy for Stephen to downplay or deny them. While Keira has tried to communicate her distress to Naomi, Naomi finds it challenging to accept the reality of the situation, often attributing Keira’s claims to misunderstandings or teenage overreactions.
The trauma of the abuse is heightened by Keira’s feeling of isolation within her own home and separation from her father. Naomi’s unintentional dismissiveness creates an environment where Keira feels unheard and invalidated.
Keira’s bond with her father, Joe is strong, and she often contemplates confiding in him. However, a deep-seated fear holds her back, knowing his protective nature. Keira worries that her disclosure to her father might instigate a confrontational or even violent response towards Stephen or Naomi, exacerbating an already difficult situation.
The continuous stress and trauma have begun to show in Keira’s daily life. Once a high-performing student, she now struggles to maintain her grades. Her attendance has become erratic, and the school has contacted Naomi regarding Keira’s recent absences.
Keira’s situation represents a complex interplay of domestic abuse, parental dynamics, and the challenges of adolescence. It underscores the need for external intervention, be it counselling, social services, or legal measures, to ensure Keira’s safety and emotional well-being.
Immediate counselling and therapeutic support for Keira is necessary, along with parenting guidance sessions for Naomi to help her understand and accept her daughter’s situation. Depending on the severity of the abuse and the immediacy of threat, further protective actions, including legal measures and reporting, may need to be considered.
Participant 2
- You are the Youth Officer at KAMA Community Services
As the student undertaking the role as the Youth Support Officer in this case study, you will need to demonstrate support in the following areas with Keira.
As part of the Case Study Assessment, you will be required to demonstrate the following during your discussion with Keira.
- Arrange a private session with Keira and, if willing, with Naomi, to provide details about the rights of young persons, available community support, and protective measures.
- Create and foster a safe environment for Keira to feel comfortable in discussing the situation.
- Offer a range of information, contact numbers, and other written materials for services in the area that would support the situation with Keira.
- Maintain a record of the exact type of information that has been shared with Keira and her family.
- Note all of the key concerns, feelings, and issues raised by Keira during the discussion for further reference.
- Work collaboratively with Keira to establish short-term and long-term goals for her safety, well-being, and any other areas of concern.
- Document the goals, action steps and timeframes in Keira’s file.
- Present Keira with a list of local services – including counselling, shelters, and legal services.
- Discuss the benefits of each service and encourage Keira to access them as needed.
- Depending on Keira’s immediate needs, you will make referrals to specific services, such as youth counselling or safe houses.
- All referrals will be documented using the provided Referral Template.
- Discuss with Keira the extent of your advocacy role, ensuring clarity in expectations.
- You must document the details of the advocacy, including its scope and specific goals.
- As required you will accompany Keira to other services including and/or attending meetings.
- Record observations from these engagements, such as Keira’s comfort level and interactions.
- Act as Keira’s representative in meetings with other service providers or legal entities, always prioritising her best interests.
- Keira will be kept informed about all representation processes and any related outcomes.
- Upon culmination of the initial stages of intervention, compile a comprehensive report. This will detail all actions taken, observations made, and future recommendations concerning Keira’s situation.
