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Mission
Mission Statement: The Minuchin Center for the Family is a non-profit organization that provides structural family therapy training to individuals, and systemic consultations to organizations, working with couples and families who have been marginalized due to racism, socio-economic conditions and/or sexual orientation.
The Minuchin Center for the Family, founded in 1995, continues the work that Salvador Minuchin, MD began over 40 years ago. In 1995, in order to expand upon the work of Dr. Salvador Minuchin a group of family therapists personally trained by Dr. Minuchin founded The Minuchin Center for the Family. The Center’s goal is to carry on the mission that Dr. Minuchin began with Family Studies, which is to consult with organizations that work to empower and heal inner-city families who are challenged by poverty, racism and gender/sexual minority issues. Using the concepts of structural family therapy created by Dr. Minuchin, the Center also educates family therapists to work with these critically underserved populations. In 2003, MCF was licensed by the New York State Education Department and, as well was, granted status as a 501 (c) (3) non-profit institution.
The Minuchin Center is active in four main areas:
- Consultations: to a variety of hospital, community health, and substance abuse treatment organizations that work with clinically under-served populations. The Center consults to these organizations to foster the development of a family systems approach in all clinical services. This approach supports family preservation and family reunification.
- Extern Classes: to train clinicians in learning the systemic principles and interventions necessary to work in agencies.
- Workshop Programs: one-day workshops that address on-going training needs for family system therapists working with specialized populations such as same-sex families, families coping with divorce and co-parenting, and the impact of substance abuse on families.
- Summer Intensive: students from many countries come to the Center to learn the basic principles of systemic interventions using structural family therapy concepts. Advanced students have the opportunity to work live with families and to have their work supervised by senior faculty.
Effectiveness
For more than a decade the Minuchin Center for the Family has been successfully providing systemic consultations to a variety of organizations and agencies. For example, in a consultation with an organization assisting perinatal women in a drug treatment program, it was found that program participants had the following results:
- significantly fewer drug relapses
- significant increase in successful completion of the drug treatment program
- expanded family network of support
- a higher percentage of full-term drug-free babies compared to a similar population enrolled in a traditional outpatient therapeutic community.
In a consultation with an adolescent inpatient program for substance abusing youth the consultation led to:
- successful completion of the program increased from 23% to 46%
- parents became very active in an the family association and in family treatment
- the adolescents became more academically successful.
For our extern training and consultations, outcome measures are also used to ascertain their effectiveness. In the extern classes and the summer intensive, outcome goals are established that focus on a student’s mastery of the principles of working systemically, utilizing structural family therapy techniques and to determine the family therapist’s ability to translate those theoretical skills into clinical interventions with families. Participants and their clinical supervisors have consistently positively rated the extern and summer intensive training received at the Center.
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Our History
The Minuchin Center for the Family has been providing effective structural family therapy training for the past ten years to family therapists and systemic consultations to organizations working with clinically under-served families. The Center’s mission, theory, passion and service-focus is built on the more than 40 years of work by Dr. Sal Minuchin with countless families and institutions.
Please contact the Center to find out how our training and consultations can benefit your practice or organization.
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Who We Are
Executive Director:
Patricia C. Dowds, PhD
Email: MinuchinCenter@minuchincenter.org
Faculty: Click a name for detailed information
Amy Begel, LCSW, LMFT
Patricia C. Dowds, PhD
Jorge Colapinto, LPsych, LMFT*
Ema Genijovich, Lic.
David E. Greenan, EdD, LMFT
Richard Holm, DSW, LCSW, LMFT *
Wai-Yung Lee, PhD *
Daniel Minuchin, MA, LMFT *
Roni Schnadow, MS, RN, LMFT
George Simon, MS, LMFT
Board of Directors:
Donald Bloch, MD, President
Nancy Boyd-Franklin, PhD, Vice President
Sam Issacharoff, J.D.
Jay Lappin, LCSW
Wai-Yung Lee, PhD
Salvador Minuchin, MD
Jace Schinderman
Martha Sullivan, DSW
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