Apr 17, 2007News: Child Welfare Conference to Explore Adolescent Sexuality
By vanrozenheim
(Orono, USA) - The 13th Annual Child Welfare Conference, organized by the University of Maine School of Social Work and Eastern Maine Medical Center's SCAN committee, is bringing together experts in adolescent sexuality on April 26 to discuss facts and dispel myths about young people, sex and gender issues.
Titled “Adolescent Sexuality: What We Still Aren’t Talking About,” the conference is attracting social service professionals, educators, nurses, law enforcement officers, parents, foster parents, medical professionals and caregivers. Members or the public also are invited.
The conference is from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at the Bangor Civic Center. Registration information, including conference fees, is available by calling Robin Arnold in the School of Social Work at (207) 581-2398. The registration deadline is April 22.
Three motivating speakers include Jenny Boylan, author (She’s Not There, A Life in Two Genders) and transgender English professor at Colby College; Jane Woody, certified sex therapist, author (How Can We Talk About That? Overcoming Personal Hang-Ups So We Can Teach Kids the Right Stuff about Sex and Morality) and professor of social work at the University of Nebraska-Omaha; and Diane Elze, associate professor of social work at the University of Buffalo, who has spent most of her career working with and on behalf of gay, lesbian and transgender youth.
Boylan has been a frequent guest on a number of national television and radio programs, including the “Oprah Winfrey Show.” She also has appeared on “The Larry King Show,” “The Today Show” and has been the subject of a documentary on the CBS “48 Hours.”
The conference opens at 7:30 a.m. with registration. Susan Savell, executive director of Communities for Children and Youth, will offer opening remarks at 8:15 a.m., to be followed by Jane Woody at 8:30 a.m. and Megan Williams, executive director of Hardy Girls, Healthy Women in Waterville, at 10:15 a.m. The documentary “Ugly Ducklings” will be shown with a guided discussion following.
At 12:45 p.m., Boylan will discuss her experiences in a trans-gendered life and adolescent life in two genders.
Elze, a former Maine resident and founder of the Maine Lesbian Gay Political Alliance, now called Equality Maine, and OUTRIGHT, speaks at 2 p.m. about responding to sexual minority youths in the child welfare system, progress that’s been made and goals yet to be reached.
At 3:30 p.m., workshops will explore putting ideas into action.
The topic of the conference was selected to address important issues affecting youth today, specifically sexual practices, the high suicide and homeless rates of GLBT youth, the harassment that many GLBT adolescents in foster care and in high schools face, and how professionals can address these issues.
The conference is co-sponsored by Eastern Maine Medical Center Family Medicine Residency Program, EMMC SCAN Committee, EMMC Family Support Team, EMMC Women’s and Children’s Services, Bangor Police Department, Maine Department of Health Human Services, Maine Coalition to End Domestic Violence, Penobscot Community Health Center, Shaw House and the UMaine School of Social Work.
The conference is partially funded through Title IV-E Training Grant funds from the Maine DHHS, the Child Welfare Training Institute and the UMaine School of Social Work.
