TJJD - Juvenile Correctional Officer Supervisor - Mental Health Treatment Program (MHTP) / Crisis Stabilization Unit / Behavior Stabilization Unit (BSU) - (GID)

About the role

Oversees the daily operations of a juvenile residential mental health unit, facilitates youth rehabilitation, supervision, and personal development, and coaches their personal development in accordance with individualized treatment plans.

Responsibilities

• Facilitates unit programming, schedule, and safety protocols.
• Utilizes Texas Model interventions and other trained interventions to help youth improve their overall level of safety, communication, and emotion regulation.
• Provides supervision and direct care for youth in a residential correctional facility, supervises other Juvenile Correctional Officers during shifts, and ensures the safety and security of youth and staff.
• Serves as a coach and role model to other levels of JCOs to help them learn appropriate methods and interventions, focusing on retention and support for newly hired JCOs in their first year.
• Holds youth accountable in ways that fit the level of behavior, seeking to help youth to learn socially acceptable responses and approaches.
• Intervenes when observing youth engaging in disruptive, self-injurious, and/or suicidal behavior.
• Attends mandatory meetings by being an active participant, sharing information, and learning new skills.
• Uses good judgment in determining when safety is at risk and higher levels of intervention are required.
• Helps youth to identify their responses to stress, fear, and other triggers and works with the youth to learn ways to increase emotional self-regulation skills.
• Practices and models appropriate self-regulation skills and remains calm during times of stress and crisis.
• Helps JCOs identify and utilize their own self-regulation skills so they are equipped to co-regulate youth.
• Gains a basic knowledge of each youth's treatment plan and provides support in learning the skills and applying Texas Model and clinical interventions recommendations needed to meet those goals.
• Coaches youth on how to resolve conflict and helps to facilitate repairs with other youth and staff as appropriate.
• Participates in the Youth Service Team and provides input into each youth's treatment plan; and is a responsible and supportive team member, who understands that an effective team is composed of reliable people who provide backup and support for their fellow team members and the facility as a whole.
• Provides for a predictable schedule for youth that is transparent to them and provides warnings and prompts for all movements and transitions; and exercises appropriate independent judgment when the need arises to alter a schedule (while still maintaining transparency and warnings).
• Implements and monitors youth activities, programs, and behaviors on an individual and group basis, to ensure healthy youth engagement and to provide appropriate role modeling for all youth.
• Observes and keeps staff informed daily of significant behavioral, medical, social, emotional needs and treatment-related conditions and events known about a youth and/or the group.
• Provides services to potentially aggressive/combative youth in a correctional setting with a wide variety of temperaments (volatile, mentally ill, suicidal) and specialized needs (chemically dependent, sexual offenders/misbehaviors, emotionally disturbed, developmental delays, etc.).
• Physically restrains and secures, if necessary, sometimes aggressive youth and participates in follow-up debriefing conversations to assess the relationship and determine alternative strategies to avoid future physical restraints.
• Maintains security in buildings, grounds, and other posts; and intervenes during emergencies or altercations to prevent escapes and protect the safety of all youth.
• Conducts searches for contraband and health/safety hazards; and performs room, property, pat, and strip searches of youth as required.
• Supervises assigned youth during all of their daily activities, including on the dorm, at school, during meals, and other activities; manages all movements between activities; conducts periodic headcounts; ensures youth engage in required activities; and transfers and transports youth, on foot, in vehicles, and other forms of transportation.
• Responds appropriately to youth grievances.
• Maintains privacy and follows all policies, regulations, and laws in regards to youth records.
• Completes and maintains required records, files, and forms in a timely and accurate way.
• Performs a variety of related duties not listed, to be determined and assigned as needed.
• Performs all duties in compliance with agency safety policies and procedures: Reports safety hazards and corrects hazards when possible. Completes required documentation in the event of an accident/injury within requested timeframes. Attends work on a regular and predictable schedule in accordance with agency attendance and leave policies.

Requirements

• Must be at least 21 years of age and have a high school diploma or equivalent.
• Two (2) years of full-time wage-earning experience supervising or providing rehabilitation/treatment services to youth or adults in a treatment program, correctional program, or a residential setting (e.g., correctional officer, case manager, counselor, or probation or parole officer).
• College degree or coursework in psychology or social work is preferred.
• One (1) year of related experience, with knowledge of psychiatric patient care techniques with understanding of mental illness.

Qualifications

• Knowledge of safety and security procedures and practices.
• Knowledge of general counseling and guidance techniques with adolescents.
• Knowledge of facility rules and regulations.
• Knowledge of individual and group behavior.
• Knowledge of child development and the role of the family.
• Knowledge of causes of juvenile delinquency and current methods of juvenile offender treatment.
• Ability to remain calm and regulate one's own behavior while helping to serve as a role model for youth who are learning to self-regulate their own behavior.
• Ability to maintain healthy and engaging relationships with youth while maintaining appropriate boundaries important for healthy development.
• Ability to work with youth in an empathetic and understanding manner with sustained positive interactions.
• Ability to communicate effectively with youth to foster youth cooperation in the treatment process.
• Ability to plan and implement youth programs.
• Ability to facilitate group discussions and activities.
• Ability to set limits on youth behaviors when appropriate in a consistent, firm, and fair manner.
• Ability to intervene and redirect behavior.
• Ability to appropriately respond to abusive language and behavior in a manner consistent with instructions received in training.
• Ability to remain alert, observant, and physically able to respond appropriately to work situations or emergencies including, but not limited to, physical restraint of youth.
• Ability to learn verbal and physical crisis intervention/de-escalation techniques and emergency treatment procedures.
• Ability to train new staff to the Mental Health Unit.
• Ability to maintain order and discipline.
• Ability to physically restrain youth, when necessary.