Parenting Coordinator Training - Day 4 & 5

Thursday & Friday, September 19 & 20, 2013
Time: 9:00 am – 5:00 pm (EACH day)
UBC Robson Square (HSBC Hall), 800 Robson Street, Vancouver

Who should attend: All those wishing to offer parenting coordination as part of their client services: family lawyers, mediators, arbitrators, parenting coordinators, and mental health and collaborative professionals.

Learning level: All levels

Background
Parenting coordination is a child focused-dispute resolution process offered to separated, divorced, and divorcing parents who need assistance in child-centered issues. Parenting coordination helps the parents and their child(ren) move forward to healthier and more satisfying decisions.

This 40-hour training is suitable for mental health professionals, mediators, and lawyers. Experienced family law lawyers, counsellors, social workers, family therapists and psychologists who have special training in mediating and arbitrating parenting disputes also require 40 hours of parenting coordinator training under the Family Law Act. Attending this 5-day training will satisfy the 40-hour requirement. No previous experience or knowledge of parenting coordination is required. The training will include discussions using case vignettes, audio-visual materials, demonstrations, and role plays.

The Program
Days 4 and 5 will be presented by Dr. Matthew Sullivan. This part of the training will present a conceptual model of coparenting work for high conflict coparents. Disengagement through the structure of the parenting plan, and management of communication between coparents are the essential components of this parenting coordination model. He will present the nuts and bolts of constructing and management of a parallel parenting model including the use of email, shared parenting websites, and highly structured parenting coordination sessions. Dr. Sullivan will provide strategies for successful partnerships with other professionals typically involved in these cases. Participants will work with case vignettes that illustrate the ways that these cases can get derailed and pose challenges to effective case management. The last part of the presentation will address professional practice and professional risk management in this complex role.

For full details of the 5-day program, click HERE.

Law Society of BC CPD Hours: 16 hours (a minimum of TBA hours will involve aspects of professional responsibility and ethics, client care and relations, and/or practice management)

Course Instructors
Barbara Jo Fidler, PhD — Family Solutions, Toronto
Matthew J. Sullivan, PhD — Palo Alto

Planning Committee
Stephanie L. Fabbro — Hamilton Fabbro Law Corporation, Vancouver
R. Craig Neville — Watson Goepel LLP, Vancouver

CLEBC Program Coordinator
Mary Kingston, Production Manager, Programs
mkingston@cle.bc.ca

Course Instructors
Barbara Jo Fidler, PhD — Family Solutions, Toronto
Matthew J. Sullivan, PhD — Palo Alto

Planning Committee
Stephanie L. Fabbro — Hamilton Fabbro Law Corporation, Vancouver
R. Craig Neville — Watson Goepel LLP, Vancouver

About the Course Instructors

Matthew J. Sullivan, PhD is a native northern Californian, who received his AB from Stanford University and PhD in clinical community psychology from the University of Maryland in 1985. Since that time, he has been in private practice in Palo Alto, California, specializing in forensic and clinical work in the Family Courts. His full-time private practice focuses on work with high conflict shared custody situations. He serves in a variety of court-related roles, including mediator, coparent counselor, parenting coordinator, testifying expert, and consultant. He has written numerous articles and book chapters, and presented and done trainings at national and international venues on topics such as high-conflict divorce, parenting coordination, child alienation, mental health consultation in family law cases, and court-involved therapy.

Dr. Sullivan is currently serving on the editorial board of the Journal of Child Custody, and serves on the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (AFCC) international board of directors and the AFCC California board of directors. He was co-chair of the AFCC task force which developed guidelines for Court-Involved Therapists and served on the AFCC Task Force on Parenting Coordination, which developed the first guidelines for Parenting Coordination practice. Dr. Sullivan served on the American Psychological and American Bar Association working group on legal and psychological interventions with children and families. He is the co-founder of Overcoming Barriers, inc., which is a non-profit organization that has developed a variety of programs for high conflict shared custody arrangements. Dr. Sullivan received the 2012 Joseph Drown award for outstanding service to children, presented by the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts, California chapter.

Coparenting Work: Understanding, Constructing and Maintaining a Parallel Parenting Model for High Conflict Coparents

Disengagement Strategies

• using parenting plans to reduce engagement
• structuring functional coparent engagement: the PC as the communication manager
  • managing child-focused information exchange
    • the use of cyberspace in shared parenting
  • resolution strategies for disputes that come up as coparents implement their parenting plans
    • process issues versus substantive issues
    • from simple arbitration to dispute resolution

Coordination of Professional Involvement

• child therapist-PC teamwork
• expanding the team

When the PC Process Gets Derailed: Case Vignettes, Discussion

• using a series of vignettes to illustrate typical challenges in the work: challenges to authority, boundary violations

Afternoon

Managing Parenting Coordination Practice in the 21st century

• connectivity: setting and maintaining boundaries
• websites, threats to practice

PC Practice Issues: Using a Series of Vignettes to Identify Common Ethical and Professional Practice Issues; Discussion of Strategies to Manage and Minimize Risk

• conflicts of interest, fee management, impartiality, and more

For more details on the 5-day Agenda, click HERE.