The Project BEST Champion Award – Cathy Joyner
This award is given to an outstanding Senior Leader who has championed the mission of Project BEST and the implementation of Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) and other evidence-based practices. This individual is truly a “champion” of establishing evidenced-based interventions for abused and traumatized children as the standard of care in their community. They have worked to strengthen collaboration among the community change team, found ways to overcome barriers to TF-CBT implementation, and worked effectively to build capacity in their community to provide trauma-informed, evidenced based services to all children and families who need them.
Cathy Joyner Nomination Essay for Project BEST Champion Award- Sept. 14, 2011
I am proud and honored to have the privilege of nominating Cathy Joyner for the Project Best Champion Award. In reading the requirements of the nominees, Cathy herself was perfectly described. Cathy has worked for the Charleston Dorchester Mental Health Center (CDMHC) for 20 years, mostly working with, and on behalf of, children and families with trauma. I have had the pleasure of working alongside Cathy for 18 of those years and have the utmost respect and admiration for all her contributions to trauma focused research and treatment for children and their families. Cathy has had several commendations for her excellent work and dedication to the effective treatment of children and families to include an Employee of the Year nomination in 1995 for our Center. She has been both the Vice-President and President of the South Carolina Association for Family Based Services. She has an extensive resume in the area of trauma treatment and early intervention with children, and our Center’s clients, families, staff, and the community have benefited from her years of dedication to these very important causes.
Since 1991, Cathy has been instrumental in the development and implementation of several collaborative projects focused on children and family trauma treatment. She was a leader and therapist with the Village Early Intervention Project on John’s Island, which started in 1995. This was a coordination of treatment across disciplines including therapeutic child care, mental health treatment, and substance abuse treatment. She was the leader of the PEACE project (beginning in 2000) – an initiative involving the coordination of the Medical University of South Carolina, the Department of Mental Health, the Department of Social Services, Charleston County School District, and the National Institute of Mental Health) to provide Multi-Systemic Therapy to families identified by the DSS for physical abuse of adolescents. She coordinated this project and provided case management with other community agencies to include (but not limited to) DNLCC, DJJ, DSS, CCSD, and the Continuum of Care. At the end of this collaborative she continued to provide consultation and assisted in the development of MST treatment manuals still in use today.
Cathy has been intimately involved in several community based trauma response collaborations. She was the team leader for 1.5 years for the Hugo Outreach Support Team (beginning in 1989 after Hurricane Hugo) where she supervised and provided individual, group, and family counseling around trauma and recovery in community based settings. She networked with community and national agencies, institutions and government bodies to provide information and to coordinate and implement interventions. She was instrumental in training CDMHC staff and inter and intra- agency training in post-trauma stress counseling, counseling children and families after natural disasters, and on stress in disaster workers. In 2007, she participated in the CDMHC Emergency Response Team’s response to the Sofa Superstore tragedy where nine firefighters died. She facilitated trauma treatment of the children and families of the fallen firefighters for over a year, while still leading a large team of clinical staff. Our Center is now the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) for the Charleston Firefighters. Cathy continues to be an active member of CDMHC’s Emergency Response Team, which responds to community disaster needs locally and otherwise.
Cathy has had two professional publications in the area of trauma treatment: An invited chapter, “Individual, Group and Family Counseling After a Hurricane” in the publication Boyd-Webb, N. (Ed.) Play Therapy with Children in Crisis -Guildford Publications, Inc., New York, N.Y., 1991. She also contributed to an invited chapter: “Community-Level Interventions After a Disaster” in Saylor, C. (Ed.) Children and Disasters – Plenum Press, New York, N.Y., 1993.
Over the past 20 years, Cathy has contributed greatly to and held several roles promoting and teaching the use of evidenced based practices, including TFCBT. She is a therapist, a manager/leader, a trainer, and a consultant for our Center, as well as a trainer and consultant for other community agencies. She is always family focused and evidenced based treatment oriented. She is a community liaison for our Center on behalf of children and families and a leader for Project Best. She has spearheaded all of our early intervention programs and services for CDMHC and has been very involved with our PCIT program here. She continues to work closely with our state trauma liaison to provide an array of trauma training for our staff.
Cathy’s current role at CDMHC is Staff Training/Resource Development Director. She leads our initiative/strategic plan to have all therapists trained, practicing, and getting appropriate supervision around several evidenced based practices (EBP’s) to include TFCBT. (Other EBP’s we are focused on currently are CBT, MI, EMDR, PCIT, DBT…). She works with our entire Center in team meetings and individually to promote the identification and treatment of trauma and to increase the use of EBP’s. She provides or coordinates trainings for all of our staff on evidenced based trainings to include TFCBT. She continues to collaborate with all the child serving agencies in our area to represent the needs of our clients and all children in need in our community.
Cathy Joyner deserves to hold the Project Best Champion Award. She has over 20 years of experience as a clinician, a supervisor, trainer, and advocate for the treatment of child trauma. She is a seasoned, licensed clinician whose dedication to this mission is evident every day in her interactions with our staff, community agencies, and children and families we serve. She is a very hands on clinician and supervisor and if you have had the privilege to work with Cathy, you have already witnessed her experience, talent, and dedication to improve the lives of children and families that have suffered from trauma. If you haven’t met Cathy, I hope you get the chance to meet her. She will be happy to share a lot of current mental health information and research about trauma, children, early intervention, adults, etc… She will probably bring up children within the first five minutes…
This nomination written by:
Jennifer Roberts, LPC – Performance Improvement Director/Corporate Compliance Officer – Charleston Dorchester Mental Health Center
Also in support of nomination:
Deborah Blalock, LPC – Executive Director – Charleston Dorchester Mental Health Center
Valerie O’Neal, RN – Clinic Director – Charleston Mental Health Center
