Assignment: Ethical Practices in Human Services

Assignment: Ethical Practices in Human Services
Topic Selection and Proposal

For this assignment, you will select a topic on ethical practices in human services. This topic will be the basis for your assignments throughout the course. This is the topic for which you will develop a professional training seminar for staff members in an organization or local community for the final project assignment. Your topic must address a specific ethical issue in human services that is present in organizational operations and delivery of clinical or community services.

Read all the course assignments and choose a topic. Make sure the topic you have chosen will work in all the assignments in the course.

Assignment: Ethical Practices in Human Services

For this assignment, select a topic from this list of possible topics:

Duty to warn, confidentiality, and malpractice liability.
Clinical or organizational research and counseling or organizational relationships—confidentiality and informed consent.
Boundaries and the ethical use of power.
Efficacy of treatment and assessing outcomes.
Multicultural competence—ethical practice in an increasingly diverse world.
Confidentiality and implications of HIPAA and managed care in human services.
Multiple or dual relationships in human services professional practice.
Ethical practice working in collaboration with multiple agencies and organizations.
Ethical challenges working with groups, couples, families, or communities.
Competence and the ethics of self-care.
Other selected ethical issue to be approved by the instructor.

Assignment: Ethical Practices in Human Services

Once you have selected a topic, select the professional code of ethics (for example, the ethics code of the National Organization for Human Services, American Counseling Association, or the National Association of Social Workers) that you will use as your basis for analyzing the ethical issues involved.

In your assignment submission, include the following:

In a paragraph format, the topic you selected and a discussion of the ethical issues involved.
The ethical code you have selected to use and a discussion of the specific elements of that code of ethics that relate to your topic.
Three current empirical research articles (no more than five years old) addressing the selected topic and the ethical issues related to your selected code of ethics. Be sure that sufficient scholarly research exists before submitting your project topic. Cite and summarize each article, and indicate how it relates to your selected topic and ethical code.
Headings that correspond to the key points in the scoring rubrics. Review sections 3.02–3.03 of the APA manual (6th edition) for guidance on headings.

Assignment: Ethical Practices in Human Services

Assignment Requirements

Written communication: Written communication is free of errors that detract from the overall message.
APA formatting: Headings, references, and citations are formatted according to current APA style and formatting.
Length of paper: 3–5 typed, double-spaced pages, not counting the cover page and references.
Font and font size: Times New Roman, 12 point.

Unit2Disc1
Informed Consent

Review the scenarios in Exercise 3.2 on page 66 ***(SEE BELOW)***of your textbook and view any related media. In your initial post, discuss the purpose of informed consent and how it would apply to two of the scenarios. Respond to the following in relation to informed consent:

What are the ethical responsibilities of the human service professional in the scenarios you selected?
What are the ethical responsibilities of the human service professional to obtain informed consent for disclosures to a third party or for participation in research?
What are the risks or challenges with disclosure in a situation where there may be a reason to breach confidentiality (such as potential harm to the client or others)?

Assignment: Ethical Practices in Human Services

Exercise 3.2

An Issue of Informed Consent

Directions: Below you will find a number of scenarios involving a helper and a client for whom informed consent is an issue. As you read the scenarios, identify what, if anything, you would tell the client.

Scenario 1: Allison has been directed by her employer to go to counseling at their Employee Assistance Program (EAP) because of her “attitude at work.’’ The EAP has been directed to evaluate Allison for drug use and to make a report to the employer. What, if anything, should the EAP counselor tell the client?
Scenario 2: Timothy walks into his high school counselor’s office. Timothy says that he is thinking about running away from home. Further, he states that if he is unable to get away from his parents, he will “kill himself.” What information should the counselor convey to this client?
Scenario 3: A child psychiatrist is working with an 8-year-old child with severe attention deficit with hyperactivity. The child’s parent told him that this was an “allergy doctor” who may give him some “allergy” medicine. What do you feel the psychiatrist should tell the client?

Assignment: Ethical Practices in Human Services

Unit2Disc2
Working With Vulnerable Populations

Discuss issues and concerns related to working with vulnerable populations, such as children, the elderly, those who are incarcerated, or those with physical or mental impairments. Based on readings about vulnerable populations from the studies for this unit or other literature, discuss your understanding of voluntary consent and challenges when working with vulnerable populations. Identify specific laws and ethical standards in your state that apply to working with vulnerable populations, reporting child or elder abuse, and conducting research with vulnerable populations.

ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CLASS

Discussion Questions (DQ)

• Initial responses to the DQ should address all components of the questions asked, include a minimum of one scholarly source, and be at least 250 words.
• Successful responses are substantive (i.e., add something new to the discussion, engage others in the discussion, well-developed idea) and include at least one scholarly source.
• One or two sentence responses, simple statements of agreement or “good post,” and responses that are off-topic will not count as substantive. Substantive responses should be at least 150 words.
• I encourage you to incorporate the readings from the week (as applicable) into your responses.

Weekly Participation

• Your initial responses to the mandatory DQ do not count toward participation and are graded separately.
• In addition to the DQ responses, you must post at least one reply to peers (or me) on three separate days, for a total of three replies.
• Participation posts do not require a scholarly source/citation (unless you cite someone else’s work).
• Part of your weekly participation includes viewing the weekly announcement and attesting to watching it in the comments. These announcements are made to ensure you understand everything that is due during the week.

APA Format and Writing Quality

• Familiarize yourself with APA format and practice using it correctly. It is used for most writing assignments for your degree. Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for APA paper templates, citation examples, tips, etc. Points will be deducted for poor use of APA format or absence of APA format (if required).
• Cite all sources of information! When in doubt, cite the source. Paraphrasing also requires a citation.
• I highly recommend using the APA Publication Manual, 6th edition.

Use of Direct Quotes

• I discourage overutilization of direct quotes in DQs and assignments at the Masters’ level and deduct points accordingly.
• As Masters’ level students, it is important that you be able to critically analyze and interpret information from journal articles and other resources. Simply restating someone else’s words does not demonstrate an understanding of the content or critical analysis of the content.
• It is best to paraphrase content and cite your source.

 

LopesWrite Policy

• For assignments that need to be submitted to LopesWrite, please be sure you have received your report and Similarity Index (SI) percentage BEFORE you do a “final submit” to me.
• Once you have received your report, please review it. This report will show you grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors that can easily be fixed. Take the extra few minutes to review instead of getting counted off for these mistakes.
• Review your similarities. Did you forget to cite something? Did you not paraphrase well enough? Is your paper made up of someone else’s thoughts more than your own?
• Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for tips on improving your paper and SI score.

Late Policy

• The university’s policy on late assignments is 10% penalty PER DAY LATE. This also applies to late DQ replies.
• Please communicate with me if you anticipate having to submit an assignment late. I am happy to be flexible, with advance notice. We may be able to work out an extension based on extenuating circumstances.
• If you do not communicate with me before submitting an assignment late, the GCU late policy will be in effect.
• I do not accept assignments that are two or more weeks late unless we have worked out an extension.
• As per policy, no assignments are accepted after the last day of class. Any assignment submitted after midnight on the last day of class will not be accepted for grading.

Communication

• Communication is so very important. There are multiple ways to communicate with me: 
  • Questions to Instructor Forum: This is a great place to ask course content or assignment questions. If you have a question, there is a good chance one of your peers does as well. This is a public forum for the class.
  • Individual Forum: This is a private forum to ask me questions or send me messages. This will be checked at least once every 24 hours.