Case Management of a 15 Year Old Steve Z

Sarah Harris

Referred Case: Steve Z, a 15-year-old truant student

The subject in the given case is a chronic absentee from school --he regularly skips school without a valid reason, and has received a referral to a family court, which has ordered him to go to school properly; however, he still remains continually (and unlawfully) absent. Unexcused absenteeism or truancy from school is associated with serious delinquency during youth and with considerable affectations in negative characters and actions during adulthood. Familial factors play a role in a child's truancy as they are essentially of a personal nature. Parents' turning a blind eye to such absenteeism is particularly influential, since it underlines a lack of penalties for undesirable/reckless conduct on the child's part. The boy demonstrates a lack of respect towards teachers, and this strained relationship between him and his teachers accentuates his habit of frequently keeping off classes. Personal factors influencing truancy in Steve include: poor social skills and self-worth; bad relations with peers; deficient academic aptitude; poor concentration; and special needs. For successfully dealing with Steve's truancy problem, the basic issues and grounds for truancy have to initially be recognized and resolved.

1. Service plan

Case planning is aimed at matching teenagers with suitable rehabilitative means. The key conditions include criminal history of the teen and the newly-emerged case's nature. The tool, YASI (Youth Assessment and Screening Instrument) is employed for the purpose of collecting data on the teen's background, legal history, peer/community relationships, school attendance, other academic matters, physical and mental well-being, violent tendencies and alcohol/drug consumption. In the given case, as the subject, Steve purposefully decides to remain absent from school, authorities of his school must intervene in a timely manner and motivate him to be regular in his attendance, in future (Ross, 2012).

2. Coordination of client to appropriate services

The widely-recognized definition given by Solomon for case management will be utilized by the coordinator for service coordination with regard to youth/child care; according to Solomon, case management refers to a coordinated approach for facilitating availability of services to clients at the time, place, and duration of time the services are required. Service coordination, in Solomon's case, is more wide-ranging and qualitatively dissimilar from the conventional models of case management. Resource coordinators of the Adolescent Diversion Program (ADP) are members of the court, tasked with creating working associations with a variety of service providers in the area, and with recommending and overseeing defendant conformity with services. Low-risk teen cases are let off in justice's interests during the first ADP appearance at court (Ross, 2012).

3. Monitoring progress of client

In the duration of 1-2 months that lapse between the initial and subsequent ADP court appearance, ADP resource coordinator checks teen obedience of court orders, contact with assigned intervention programs, as well as with school officials, probation officers, child protection service personnel, and other authorities (as appropriate). In case there are issues with compliance, the teen along with his/her parent/caregiver may be requested to meet unofficially with the resource coordinators, prosecution, judge, and defense counsel for addressing the problems with compliance. Such conferences take place outside of courtrooms; teen and family can also attend conferences with only the resource coordinator in attendance (Ross, 2012).

4. Advocacy for client