March is National Social Work Month! LCYC would like to recognize and thank the numerous social workers that play a positive role in the lives of young people, supporting each youth’s self-determination, equipping youth with tools and resources to meet their basic needs and advance their stated goals. Social workers do so much to support the young people that we serve to ensure they are connected with resources, and safe and secure housing. In their roles, social workers help families overcome ongoing or unexpected hardships and barriers to stable living with respect and empathy. Social workers are an essential part to our community.
LCYC takes a holistic approach to our services – it is important to care for a person in their entirety and help them address all barriers that are obstructing their access to housing and safety. These barriers are often across many disciplines and require the expertise of different perspectives to address. Legal services alone are rarely a complete solution for young people in crisis. We depend heavily on social workers and other non-legal professionals, such as therapists, housing navigators, teachers, caseworkers, shelter staff, community organizers, and too many more to name to help provide necessary supports to young people throughout Washington state. Our work would not be as successful without their efforts and input.
Through LCYC’s Youth Homelessness Programs, we provide free civil legal services to young people experiencing homelessness, unstable housing, or at risk of homelessness. The Youth Homelessness Programs are continuously supported through Youth Engagement Teams in King County and Walla Walla. The Youth Engagement Teams consist of housing navigators, caseworkers, and therapists from Accelerator Y, Friends of Youth, and the Blue Mountain Action Council. In collaboration with these organizations, we are able to support young people’s legal needs, as well as their housing, mental health, stability, employment and educational needs, aiding employment ones to aid young people in strengthening their support systems and achieving their goals.
The connections and community that LCYC has built with non-legal professionals has been invaluable in our goal of improving not only our work, but civil legal aid as a whole. Our partners have provided their unique perspectives to the holistic approach and connected us directly to young people interested in informing us of ways to improve the access to civil legal aid services. Further, these collaborations have been central in creating legal literacy materials. Our community partners have been vocal about the need for clear and concise information abouton legal rights and solutions. Through ongoing conversations about pressing topics, we were able to construct legal and non-legal resources pages for King County, Walla Walla County, and Benton-Franklin Counties, tailor the outreach we conduct, and create informative videos that will be released soon in our newsletter, and on our Instagram and Facebook.
Through the end of March, we will be highlighting a few of the non-legal professionals that we work with that make our work possible on our social media. To all the social workers and other non-legal professionals connected to LCYC’s team, we thank you for your selfless dedication, incredible hard work, and continued advocacy!