Transitions to Adulthood Center for Research June 2023 Newsletter
In this Issue...
  • 5 Tips for Culturally Competent Mental Health Care to LGBTQIA+ Youth & Young Adults
  • Trauma informed care for LGBTQ+ youth w/ Antonia Barba, LCSW Podcast
  • New Tip Sheet: Applying for a Job - The Young Adult's Guide
  • New Blog: Creating & maintaining a schedule while working from home
  • New Podcast Ep.9 - Trauma is a Thief - Reclaiming Your Power
  • Tip Sheet: My Must Have Papers - Managing the Paperwork of "Adulting"
5 Tips to Provide Culturally Competent
Mental Health Care to LGBTQIA+ Youth & Young Adults
In the face of stigma, violence, adverse life events, and worsened mental health, having supportive, affirming adults in their lives can have a significantly positive effect on LGBTQIA+ youth and young adults. According to the Trevor Project, “LGBTQ youth who report having at least one accepting adult were 40% less likely to report a suicide attempt in the past year.” Our Resource Guide offers 5 tips to help mental health professionals provide affirming and accepting culturally competent care to LGBTQIA+ youth and young adults. This guide can also be helpful for anyone with a loved one in the LGBTQIA+ community.
Trauma Informed Care for LGBTQ+ Youth
Have you listened to our podcast yet? Here's a great episode to start with.

Join our conversation with Antonia Barba, as she guides us through her expertise in trauma-informed, affirming care for LGBTQ+ youth. We touch on how clinicians can work with caregivers on a supportive response to gender and sexual identities, the intersectionalities of LGBTQ+ youth, advocacy work, and even dive into the systemic issues within our healthcare system. Listen below.

Applying for a Job - The Young Adult's Guide
Applying for a Job: The Young Adult's Guide is a good starting point for your young adult in their job search journey. From considering pay, thinking about growth opportunities, and what type of job you might like (in person versus remote), the tip sheet gives a great overview to help get started. There are short topics like creating a professional online presence and securing references and we've included a helpful list of resources, including ones on how to develop networking skills.
How to Create & (Actually) Follow a Schedule: Learning and Working from Home with a Mental Health Condition
Do you find it difficult to motivate yourself while working or learning from home when you have a mental health condition? Is it hard to stay organized and stay on task when you are struggling with anxiety or depression? Our latest young adult blog post has tips on how to prioritize tasks, use tools like the Pomodoro Technique, minimize distractions, and more. These tips can help you create a schedule, get things done and help keep your mental health in check.
Joan was diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), in part from the tangled web family relations can weave. Like many youth transitioning to adulthood, she was left alone to overcome the traumas dealt to her growing up, leaving her confused and powerless. In this episode, Joan shares her story about how she was able to find her power again, including her experience with EMDR therapy.

S.T.A.Y. Tuned: Supporting Transition-Age Youth Podcast is a podcast for young adults, made by young adults, with mental health conditions.
In Case You Missed It
My "Must Have" Papers
Managing the Paperwork of Adulting
Managing the paperwork that comes along with "Adulting" is not fun. Our Young Adult Advisory Board and Family Advisory Board set out to make that task a little easier. This tip sheet lists all the documents and paperwork young adults may have to manage, helps identify how important each document is, and recommends how to organize all of it. Our goal is to make the transition to adulthood just a little bit easier - for all people involved, both the young adults and their supporters.
Young Adult Meme Corner
Sometimes a picture can convey a feeling that is hard to articulate. Memes often do that.
Check out the memes developed by the young adults in our National Youth Advisory Board (YAB). They get posted to our various social media platforms.

COULD YOU USE TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE?
Technical Assistance activities are an extension of the research and training activities of Transitions ACR. Our intention is to collaborate closely with numerous stakeholders requesting technical assistance in order to produce actionable practice and policy agenda. Our TA services can range from simple resource referrals to on-site development of a formal TA plan (including fact finding, goals, responsibilities, timelines and evaluation measures). 

Please complete the form below for Technical Assistance from Transitions to Adulthood Center for Research. Please note that we do not provide clinical consultation, behavioral services, or referrals.
THINGS WE DO
Additional Transition-Age Youth Resources
Many of our downloadable tip sheets and briefs, reports, articles, posters, infographics and video were developed and reviewed with input from young adults with serious mental health conditions and given their “stamp of approval”. Check out them out:


Many of our publications are also available in Spanish (en español) or Vietnamese (Tiếng Việt).
WHO WE ARE
The Transitions to Adulthood Center for Research promotes the full participation in socially valued roles of transition-age youth and young adults (ages 14-30) with serious mental health conditions. The Transitions to Adulthood Center for Research (Transitions ACR) is located within the Implementation Science and Practice Advances Research Center (iSPARC) and houses The Learning & Working During the Transition to Adulthood Rehabilitation Research & Training Center (The Learning & Working RRTC), among other projects.
The Learning & Working RRTC is a national effort that aims to improve the supports of transition-age youth and young adults (age 14-30) with serious mental health conditions successfully complete their schooling and training and move into rewarding work lives. 

Funded by the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR).
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As a Massachusetts Department of Mental Health Research Center of Excellence located within the Department of Psychiatry at UMass Chan Medical School (formerly the University of Massachusetts Medical School), iSPARC aims to improve the mental and behavioral health of all citizens of Massachusetts and beyond.
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Some of the contents of this message were developed under a grant with funding from the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research, United States Department of Health and Human Services (NIDILRR grant number 90RTEM0005). NIDILRR is a Center within the Administration for Community Living (ACL), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The contents of this message do not necessarily represent the policy of NIDILRR, ACL, and/or HHS, and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.
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