Clinical Specialist

The Clinical Specialist provides expertise and support to practitioners working with Infant Toddler Court Program (ITCP) grantees, as well other team members in implementing the Safe Babies or other infant-toddler court approach. Clinical consultation includes various levels of assistance including (1) clinical case consultation for ITCP sites, (2) coordination of and facilitation of learning activities related to Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health (IECMH), dyadic clinical approaches, and substance use disorder (SUD) topics within interdisciplinary learning collaboratives and communities, 3) development and implementation of strategies and experiential activities aimed at enhancing reflective capacity of the NRC team as well as those involved in Safe Babies work within state systems and sites,, (4) use of program data for continuous refinement of delivery of services reflecting IECMH and SUD principles, (5) relationship building with local and state child-serving partners to create referral protocols, encourage information sharing, and build cross-agency support systems, (6) remaining current in evidence-based IECMH, SUD interventions and medication assisted therapies (MAT), with particular attention to trauma responsive care in the child welfare context, and (7) work with local, state, and federal partners to further policies benefiting infants, toddlers, and their families well-being.

ESSENTIAL RESPONSIBILITIES

Technical Assistance and Relationship Building

• Build and maintain an ongoing and responsive relationship with clinical providers at implementation and outreach sites.
• Assist states and sites in identifying and implementing high-quality, culturally relevant, evidence-based services, curricula and interventions aligned with IECMH and SUD principles.
• Work collaboratively with the Safe Babies team to plan, support, coordinate, and provide all levels of technical assistance to grantees including supporting community training by project consultants.
• Collaborate with the Technical Assistance team to develop IECMH, and SUD relevant professional development resources for use in learning collaboratives or communities, site launches, or directly with individual ITCP sites.
• Conduct in-person site visits as assigned.

Reflective Practice

• Maintain current knowledge of gold-standard approaches to reflective practice and implement reflective practice activities to enhance capacity for Safe Babies staff and partners.
• Provide ongoing reflective consultation for Statewide Coordinators, Community Coordinators, Parent Leaders and others engaged in Safe Babies work.

Policy and Systems Leadership

• Maintain knowledge of infant-toddler policy issues and best practices, including, but not limited to IECMH, SUD and MAT evidence-based interventions, assessments, and screenings.
• Track and monitor promising state policies, practices, financing, and system-building efforts related to IECMH, SUD, and child welfare involved infants, toddlers, and their families.
• Develop written materials such as policy briefs, articles highlighting innovative initiatives, and technical assistance tools for state- and local-level audiences.
• Plan and facilitate intra- and cross-state meetings, webinars, conference calls, communities of practice, and other mechanisms for states to advance their IECMH and SUD related policy and systems work.
• Serve as a Safe Babies representative on the ZERO TO THREE IECMH workgroup and engage in collaborative IECMH efforts throughout the broader organization.

Clinical Content and Expertise

• Serve as a Subject Matter Expert in IECMH and SUD across various activities including developing publications, webinars, policy briefs, and strategic initiatives.
• Lead the cataloging and dissemination of evidence-based and evidence-informed IECMH and SUD programs and practices for child welfare-involved families with young children.
• Provide clinical case-consultation to Safe Babies teams, as needed.

Continuous Quality Improvement

• Gather feedback, analyze data, an