Melissa Foster
BSHS 355
November 23, 2014
Dr. Dian Allen, Ph. D., MFT, LPCC
Interview with a Social Worker Thomas Michalski This paper will provide information on the personal interview with a social worker Mr. Thomas Michalski. He obtained a LCSW (licensed clinical social worker) degree. Mr. Michalski previously worked for a long-term agency called Casey Family Services for 17 years in Hartford, CT. He holds a master’s degree in Human Services, which he earned from a local community college. At the present time, he working as an owner at Y-US and is in charge of the social services department of the young youth. Creating the young youth program has helped Mr. Michalski serve different populations. These populations include foster care, kids that were potential adoptees, teen population, and different age groups which ranged from ages 8-18 when he worked with Casey Family Services. Foster care kids are children whom were in need of a safe environment due to circumstances surrounding their lives that put them in jeopardy. The type of jeopardy these children were in could be due to mental and physical abuse, neglect, drug addicted parents, criminals, death in the family if there is only one parent, etc. Kids that are potential adoptees are those children whose parent’s parental rights have been terminated and long for parents to be theirs. This is where the potential to match the youth with families comes into play. Lastly, Mr. Michalski focuses on the teen population ages ranging from 8-18. He states that at these ages it is the hardest to place them with families because they are already set in their ways and cannot be molded. So many opt for younger children and from raising them when they can easily be influenced. Adoptee children who longed for families and needed help is what motivated Mr. Michalski to become involved in human services. Mr. Michalski says, “I came from a family where my parents divorced