Last month, UNC School of Social Work faculty members Mark Fraser, Shenyang Guo and Steve Day conducted an innovative training in Tianjin, China. Fraser and Day were here in Chapel Hill and participated via Skype with Guo, who was on-site at the Zhou Enlai School of Government at Nankai University.
The two-day training was for teachers, administrators, and MSW students to implement and evaluate the Let’s Be Friends program, which is a Chinese adaptation of the UNC School of Social Work’s Making Choices program that teaches social problem-solving skills for children.
They are starting a pilot test of Let’s Be Friends (LBF) in China in September. To prepare for that, the professors are training MSW students to deliver the LBF intervention along with teachers in the summer and after-school programs provided through China’s system of neighborhood centers.
Guo, who was on-site in China, and Professor Fan Wu (one of the co-authors of LBF, and a collaborator of Fraser and Guo for five years) did the training in Chinese. Guo translated for Fraser and Day, assisted by Wu.
The experimental training method was a success, and “might provide some clues for us in developing future international collaborations,” said Fraser.