In This Issue
Who We Are
CASRA is a statewide organization of private, not-for-profit, public benefit corporations that serve clients of the California public mental health system.
Member agencies provide a variety of services that are designed to enhance the quality of life and community participation of youth, adults and older adults living with challenging mental health issues.
Read more Highlights and Spotlights
Welcome to the CASRA Newsletter. In addition to our print articles, we are treated to John Oliver's take on mental health care from his Last Week Tonight broadcast.
You may notice some minor changes in the format. We have expanded the CASRA Agency Trainings section to include offerings that are available exclusively to CASRA Member Agencies. Next up on those learning opportunities is the upcoming CASRA Core Values Learning Series. See below for more info.
We still have the Trainings/Conferences and Learnings section that contains opportunities to all regardless of CASRA membership. Be sure to save the dates for the CASRA 2022 Fall Conference which will be presented virtually on October 19th, 26th, and November 2nd.
In our Final Thought, we honor Vin Scully, who passed away this week at the age of 94. There has been nobody better to broadcast a baseball game and make you feel that you were sitting together and enjoying the game just with him. Rest in Peace, Vinny. Member Agency Employment Opportunities and Information
Our member agencies are continually looking for new employees or volunteers to join their workforce.
To see current openings and find out additional information about CASRA Member Agencies, please click below.
 CASRA Agency Learning Opportunities
Coming in September
Starting this September, CASRA will be presenting a series of workshops that are designed to further the mission of improving services and social conditions for people with psychiattric disbilities by promoting their recovery, rehabilitation and rights.
The monthly learning opportunties will introduce new staff, refresh existing staff, and remind all staff of the values, principles and practices of Recovery and Psychosocial Rehabilitation.
The first learning session will be on Wednesday September 14th from 10 AM to Noon and the topic will be An Overview of Recovery and Psychosocial Rehabilitation. Succeeding sessions will be held on the 2nd Wednesday of the month in October, November, January, February, March, April, May and June.
Registration is limited to 35 people per session and open only to employees of CASRA member agencies.
Registration will open for the September session soon.
For more information, please contact joe@casra.org.
A benefit of membership in CASRA is receiving 4 hours of training for your staff. For more information, please contact joe@casra.org.
If you are a CASRA member agency and would like to advertise your learning opportunity, training or event for the benefit of other CASRA member agencies, please contact us at events@casra.org.
There are a few guidelines:
You are a CASRA Member Agency
Your event is free of charge
and, as a reminder the Newsletter is published on the 1st and 3rd Thursdays of the month Contact Us
The California Association of Social Rehabilitation Agencies
Mailing Address:
3350 E. 7th Street, #509
Long Beach, CA 90804
Email: casra@casra.org
Phone: (562) 343-2621
To reach us: use our Contact Form | Advocacy/Policy/News
Mental Health Care
John Oliver discusses some of the cracks in our mental health care system, some of the inadequate ways we’ve tried to fill them, and what it all has to do with the gallbladder.
Watch the Video
Researchers Champion Human Rights Based Approach to Psychosocial Disability
Even as countries ratify the CRPD, many policies are still in direct opposition to the human rights standards for psychosocial disability.
From Mad in America
By Richard Sears, August 2, 2022
In a new article published in the World Association for Psychosocial Rehabilitation Bulletin, Peter McGovern and his colleagues explore the continued human rights violations of people with a psychosocial disability in mental healthcare systems. They draw particular attention to how practitioners and policymakers can implement existing frameworks to mitigate these violations.
The authors argue that a recovery-centered approach utilizing the World Health Organization’s QualityRights initiative can create mental healthcare systems that uphold fundamental human rights as outlined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (CRPD). They write:
“This shift to a new model of understanding places the person and citizen in the center of all decisions about their lives. Furthermore, it empowers the citizen as a person with a right to be included in their community. Mental health services are viewed as an important tool, among many others, in the armory of a person navigating the complexities of a mental health condition or psychosocial disability, as well as an opportunity to recover citizenship. It is for the person to decide which tools are helpful for their recovery journey and when they should be deployed.” Read More
The Confess Project: Barbers Help Black Men Talk About Mental Health
From Mindsite News
by Akintunde Ahmad, February 25, 2022
As a child, Lorenzo Lewis spent endless hours in a barbershop owned by his aunt, reveling in the banter, laughter and murmured conversations between barbers and their customers. “I grew up in my aunt’s barbershop, and it was a safe, comforting place,” he recalls. It was the cornerstone of the Black male community, a combination of beloved social club, lounge and salon.
The barbershop would surface again in his late 20s, when Lewis worked as a case worker with troubled teens at an Arkansas juvenile detention center. Many were African American males who suffered from trauma, depression and other mental ills linked to their rough childhoods, but almost none of them had received any treatment before their encounter with the law. Lewis came up with a novel idea: Since African American boys and men had little access to therapy, why not bring therapy to them?
The ideal setting for that therapy, he decided, was the barbershop. Read More
The End of Schizophrenia
A growing number of psychiatrists maintain that, as a presumed disease entity, as an identifiable state, schizophrenia simply does not “exist.”
From Slate and Arizona State University
By Orna Ophir, July 28, 2022
In This Stranger, My Son, her 1968 memoir, Louise Wilson tells the story of her family’s struggles with mental illness. She recalls that when her son, Tony, was discharged from the hospital, her husband, a surgeon, who had had enough of hearing conflicting reports, asked for a “real diagnosis.” The psychiatrist treating Tony replied: “Schizophrenia, if you want to label it. The boy is a paranoid schizophrenic.” But, he added, schizophrenia was just a word covering a large, loose category: “it’s like saying ‘tree.’ There are all kinds—firs, elms, pines. So, there are many kinds and degrees of schizophrenia.” Shocked, Louise echoed the words: “schizophrenia, if you want a label,” while thinking of her son’s dark blue eyes, his beautiful, rare smile, but also about the “ugly contortions of his rage,” his terror and fear.
What was this strange phenomenon of Tony’s illness? Was schizophrenia merely a “loose category,” just a “label,” a “word”? But also, did it name a natural phenomenon, like a “tree”? Did schizophrenia have many kinds? Could it have many degrees? Read More
Trainings/Conferences and other Learning
Save the Dates!
CASRA 2022 Fall Conference
October 19th, 26th, and November 2nd
VirtualFinal Thoughts
"The game is just one long conversation, and I'm anticipating that, and I will say things like 'Did you know that?' or 'You're probably wondering why.' I'm really just conversing rather than just doing play-by-play. I never thought of myself as having a style. I don't use key words. And the best thing I do? I shut up."
Vin Scully |
