Healing Together: The Road to Building Collaboration, Sustainability and Well-being in Child Welfare
Friday, April 18, 2025 | Livestreamed via YouTube | 1:15-4:00 PM
Welcome! The 2025 Title IV-E Summit is designed to bring together diverse social work practices and experiences, leveraging in-person and virtual opportunities to network, learn, and build community. The Summit would not be possible without the hard work of our dedicated Student Planning Committee or our incredible presenters and attendees, who hail from every corner of the state.
Thank you for joining us, and we wish you a productive, engaging, and rewarding conference!
Title IV-E Education Program Team.
Program at a Glance
| Time | Activity |
|---|---|
| 1:15-2:30 PM | Playing Out Of the Box: Healing Childhood Trauma |
| 2:45-4:00 PM | Thriving Together: Strategies to Navigate Burnout & Enhance Well-Being |
Full Program Details
- Playing Out Of the Box: Healing Childhood Trauma (1:15-2:30 PM)
In this interactive workshop, participants will explore the profound healing potential of play therapy and its role in helping children in the child welfare system recover from trauma. Play is a natural medium through which children express their inner world, process complex emotions, and foster healing. However, many children in child welfare face challenges such as limited resources, frequent transitions, and environments where toys or therapeutic tools are not always available. This workshop highlights how, with minimal or no toys, adults can still facilitate healing by harnessing the most powerful tool children possess: their imagination.
Convener:
Christine Mark-Griffin, MSW, is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW), certified EMDR therapist and EMDRIA approved consultant. She is the founder of Spark All Wellness, a private practice specializing in EMDR therapy with children, EMDR consultation for clinicians and trauma-informed trainings for professional organizations. In the past decade, Mark-Griffin's professional experience has included working in non-profit, child welfare, juvenile justice, community mental health, school-based mental health and higher education settings. Working in these various settings over the years has deepened her knowledge and understanding of complex trauma but has also exposed her to some of the most beautiful stories of healing and resilience. Additionally, she is the author of EMDR Workbook for Kids & founder of EMDR for Kids. The mission at EMDR for Kids is to empower therapists, parents, and children of all ages with resources, tools, and advanced training to overcome trauma & adversities.- Thriving Together: Strategies to Navigate Burnout & Enhance Well-Being (2:45-4:00 PM)
- In child welfare work, unique challenges like stress, trauma, and competing priorities often lead to burnout and compassion fatigue. This workshop emphasizes self-care, self-compassion, boundary-setting, and time management to support career sustainability and personal well-being. Participants will learn about moral distress and engage with practical tools like grounding techniques, mindfulness, and emotional regulation. They will also learn about self-compassion and boundary-setting frameworks and time management tools for managing challenges in the front end and ongoing programs. Drawing on a decade of professional experience in child welfare, this workshop offers actionable tips and methods for both emerging and seasoned professionals. Let’s thrive together!
Convener:
Avni Panchal holds a Master’s of Social Work (MSW) from the University of California, Berkeley and a Bachelor’s in Psychology from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. She is also certified as a Pupil Personnel Services Credential (PPSC) and Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW). Panchal has dedicated over a decade to child welfare and was a Title IV-E recipient. Her expertise encompasses various child welfare programs, including Emergency Response, Dependency Investigations, Independent Living Program, and Adoptions. Currently, she is involved in training child welfare workers and mental health professionals across multiple training regions. She teaches at San Francisco State University in the Social Work Graduate Program. Additionally, she has a virtual private practice, providing individual and couples therapy, as well as coaching services focused on empowerment and relationship development. Panchal has extensive experience facilitating wellness sessions, dialogue circles, racial equity and inclusion, trauma-informed discussions, and other mental health and social work-related topics. She is committed to fostering a learning environment that prioritizes strength-based approaches and cultural responsiveness.
Livestream Support
The IV-E Summit livestream will be captioned. A standalone caption feed will also be available for those who wish to follow along with the event in a text-only format. The link above will display a live transcript on the day of the event.
If you encounter any difficulty accessing the livestream, or if you wish to report any technical issues with the stream, please email IV-E Summit staff at ivesummit@ucdavis.edu.
Presentation Resources
- Playing Out of the Box: Healing Childhood Trauma
- Thriving Together: Strategies to Navigate Burnout & Enhance Well-Being
Prizes & Gift Cards
Engage & Win! Want to win a gift card? It’s easy! Just participate in the YouTube live chat by asking questions to the presenters, sharing your insights or thoughts, and/or respectfully engaging with other attendees.
The more you participate, the better your chances to win! 🎁
How to Access the YouTube Live Chat:
- Make sure you’re logged into YouTube (a Google account is required).
- Click the “Live Chat” button (on desktop) or tap the chat icon (on mobile).
- Type your questions and comments in the chat box.
- Hit "Send" and join the conversation!
Our team will be monitoring the chat, selecting winners, and sharing your questions with the presenters. Don’t miss your chance to make your voice heard and win a gift card
Acknowledgements
The 2025 Title IV-E Summit would have been impossible without the hard work and dedication of our Student Planning Committee, comprised of IV-E students from across California. We also wish to acknowledge the generous contributions of our sponsors. The 2025 Title IV-E Summit is sponsored by NASW-CA, with additional support from CDSS. Learn more about NASW-CA membership.
We invite you to pause to honor ancestral grounds and support the resilience, strength, history, and traditions of Indigenous people worldwide. To learn more about Indigenous lands—perhaps where you were born, live, or have lived—we invite you to take a look at this useful resource: https://native-land.ca/.
We recognize and acknowledge that the 2025 Title IV-E Summit is taking place on the traditional homelands occupied by the Gabrieleño/Tongva people, the Toongvetam, and the shared origins of cultural knowledge and sacred teachings to the Acjachamen/Juaneño and many other Southern California Indian people. We also acknowledge the Gabrieleño/Tongva and Acjachamen/Juaneño as the traditional custodians of the Los Angeles region along with the Chumash to the north and west, and the Tataviam and Cahuilla Nations to the east. We respect and value the many ways the Tongva/Acjachemen cultural heritage and beliefs continue to have significance to the living people and remind us about the sacred and spiritual relationship that has always existed here at what we now call Long Beach.