Information Hub / Events Continuing Education
Supporting Foster Youth Through A Relational and Culturally Responsive Lens
12:00 PMFriday, October 23 2026
11:00 AMFriday, October 23 2026
10:00 AMFriday, October 23 2026
9:00 AMFriday, October 23 2026
8:00 AMFriday, October 23 2026
6:00 AM
Tamera Peterson, LCSW, ADHD-CCSP, is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and founder of Thrive Collective Services, a Virginia-based mental health practice providing trauma-informed therapy and psychoeducation for children, adolescents, young adults, and families. With over 15 years of experience across community-based, crisis, outpatient, and telehealth settings, she specializes in trauma, emotional regulation, executive functioning, ADHD, and culturally responsive mental health care.
Tamera is passionate about supporting foster youth and underserved communities through relational, strengths-based, and developmentally responsive approaches. She currently serves as the Virginia Chapter Director for A Home Within, an organization dedicated to providing consistent, relationship-based mental health support for youth impacted by foster care. Her work focuses on helping clinicians, caregivers, and systems better understand behavior through a trauma-informed and relational lens while increasing access to meaningful mental health support.
This 2-hour continuing education workshop explores how foster care experiences, relational disruptions, chronic stress, and systemic factors can influence executive functioning, emotional regulation, engagement, and behavior in children and adolescents. Participants will examine how behaviors commonly interpreted as noncompliance, defiance, lack of motivation, or symptoms of ADHD may also reflect trauma-related adaptations, disrupted relationships, or attempts to establish safety, control, and predictability.
Using a relational, culturally responsive, and developmentally informed lens, the course provides practical strategies for distinguishing skill-based executive functioning difficulties from trauma-related adaptations while recognizing that both may occur simultaneously. Participants will explore approaches to strengthening regulation, engagement, and relational safety, including externalizing tasks, routine anchors, task chunking, reflective practices, somatic awareness, and intentional use of the therapeutic relationship.
The workshop also addresses the unique challenges of providing services to foster youth through telehealth. Participants will apply principles of attunement, structure, and flexibility to improve engagement and will examine when persistent barriers indicate a need to reassess the treatment approach, level of care, modality, or referral. Case examples and interactive reflection will support participants in translating these concepts into clinical practice with foster youth.
This course is eligible for 2 continuing education credits.
This course is suitable for Psychologists, LMHCs, MFTs, Social Workers, LPCs, and Counselors.
Intermediate
12:00–12:10pm Welcome, disclosure, course overview, learning objectives, and opening reflection on presentations commonly seen in foster youth.
12:10–12:30pm Behavior in context
12:30–12:50pm Relational telehealth framework
12:50–1:15pm Clinical tools
1:15–1:35pm Malik case
1:35–1:55pm Jordan case
1:55–2:00pm Telehealth tool review, participant reflection, questions, and closing.
At the end of the workshop, participants will be able to:
- List at least three ways foster care experiences, relational disruptions, chronic stress, and systemic factors may affect executive functioning, emotional regulation, and behavioral presentation in foster youth.
- Identify at least three relational, culturally responsive, and developmentally appropriate interventions that can be used to support regulation, executive functioning, and engagement with foster youth, including within telehealth practice.