Development and Validation of a Self-Report Measurement Scale of Summer Camp Counselor Burnout

Each summer, nearly one million seasonal staff work at overnight camps in the U.S. (ACA, 2021). Camp counselors typically fall between the ages of 18 to 25, with many within the 18 to 20 age range (Lubeznik-Warner et al., 2022). Despite their young age, camp counselors are tasked with considerable responsibility, including planning programs, facilitating activities, and caring for campers’ physical, emotional, and social well-being (Epley et al., 2017; Johnson et al., 2011). Due to the combination of a large workload, lack of separation between work and personal life, and limited free time, some camp counselors experience burnout, defined as an occupational phenomenon characterized by exhaustion, mentally distancing oneself from work, and reduced sense of professional efficacy (Bailey et al., 2012; Paisley & Powell, 2007; Wahl-Alexander et al., 2017; WHO, 2019). Burnout can have consequences for job performance including lower effectiveness at work, reduced commitment to one’s role, and exhaustion, which can all negatively impact camp operations including the quality of childcare provided (Maslach et al., 2001). As such, it is important for camp administrators to be aware of which camp counselors are experiencing burnout so that they may intervene to mitigate negative outcomes; however, there is not yet a validated measure for camp counselor burnout. The purpose of the current study is to develop and validate a self-report camp counselor burnout scale. In Study 1, I created a list of potential scale items based on prior research, revised them based on expert feedback, and refined the resulting questionnaire using cognitive interviews. I then analyzed data from camp counselors using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to identify the factor structure of the scale. In Study 2, I collected data from another group of camp counselors for analysis using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to test the hypothesized factor structure. Using these data, I conducted tests of validity to establish construct validity and regression analyses to analyze associations between camp counselor burnout and hypothesized predictors of burnout

Latinos in Massachusetts: Dominicans

The Gastón Institute’s 2024 Latinos in Massachusetts series includes this statewide report on the Dominican population in Massachusetts. This report analyzes Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS) data from the 2022 American Community Survey (ACS) conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. Our descriptive analysis uses both household- and individual-level data to estimate population size and percentages and to compare Dominicans to Other Latinos and Non-Latinos in the state

Monima: A Novel of the Immigrant Experience in the Multilingual Early Republic

First published in 1802, Monima offers a unique look at the lives of the poor in Philadelphia: Describing her novel as a very plain picture of life, a plea on behalf of the oppressed, and life-worn children of affliction,\u27\u27 the author exposes the class fractures within a society we have mythologized as egalitarian (99). Such myths, the novel shows, are based on ignorance; as one character, awakened to the existence of the poor, remarks, one half of the world don\u27t know how the other half live (196). Though the identity of Monima\u27s author was not discovered for over 220 years, the novel\u27s focus on the immigrant underclass reflects her lived experience. Mary Endress Ralston was the trilingual child of German and French immigrants whose fortunes rose and fell in the Revolutionary era. But rather than writing a factual record of her life, Mary Ralston created her portrait of Monima and her world through a complex multilingual and multiethnic alchemy. The resulting novel, which highlights language justice through the trials of its beleaguered heroine and her father, is a complex synthesis of literary modes that has been largely overlooked. We are proud to present Monima, the first American novel by an English,language learner, and Mary Endress Ralston, an early American novelist who has been hiding in plain sight

AHP\u27s Tribute To Dr. Stan Charnofsky

The Association for Humanistic Psychology (AHP) mourns the “transition” of a very dear soul, Dr. Stan Charnofsky. And, while his transition is a tremendous loss to his family, friends, and colleagues, we also want to honor and celebrate a life well-lived. As a former AHP president, Stan provided outstanding leadership. Upon his passing, he also held the distinction of being the longest-serving AHP board member. He was very much cherished and highly respected by all board members throughout his long, dedicated and remarkable service to AHP and its members

Massachusetts Community Mediation Center Grant Program Fiscal Year 2024 Report and Evaluation

In FY2024, the Commonwealth allocated $3,213,465 to the CMC Grant Program, supplemented by$149,674 carried over from FY2023, for a total of $3,363,139. Of the total funding,$2,542,100 (76%) was awarded to Centers in grants and technical assistance, with Centers leveraging these funds to secure an additional $2,199,813 from private foundations and other state, local, and federal sponsors. These grants supported Centers’ participation in CMC Grant Program related statewide programs, including the Housing Mediation Program (HMP), Reentry Mediation Program (ReMAp), Youth Conflict Resolution and Restorative Practices Program (Youth Program), and DEI organizational capacity-building initiatives. These grants bolstered staffing infrastructure, enabling Centers to meet community needs and accounting for over half of their collective revenue, making this state funding vital for Center sustainability and statewide access to dispute resolution for Massachusetts residents. The CMC Grant Program had a significant impact in FY2024. The HMP preserved 355 tenancies and 103 housing subsidies across 1,487 mediated cases, helping 1,188 landlords and 1,376 tenants avoid eviction or housing loss. As one tenant shared, “Thanks to mediation, I’ve been able to get things under control. I will definitely recommend it to others, this is a wonderful program.” A pilot partnership with MassHousing’s Tenancy Assistance Program (TAP) expanded the program’s reach by mediating 12 upstream cases involving issues like noise complaints and discrimination and conducting community-building workshops to equip residents at TAP-enrolled sites with conflict resolution skills. ReMAp worked with 12 DOC and Sheriff facilities, providing pre-release mediation and expanding post-release support to reduce recidivism and strengthen family ties. Party feedback reflected the program\u27s impact, with one noting, “Today was a good day,” and another commenting, “This was great and productive.” The Youth Program showed significant gains in student social and emotional learning skills, with one administrator highlighting the program’s long-term value: “These are lifelong skills that can be applied in both school and life situations.” The DEI Initiative further enhanced the Program’s impact, with Centers improving language accessibility, program flexibility, and policies to support inclusivity and equity. For example, this included the development of Spanish-language conflict resolution workshops, which led to an increase in inquiries from Spanish-speaking individuals. As one Center noted, “We’ve been able to better train staff and volunteers and provide services in ways community members understand.

Tienen alas, pero no las pueden usar: Stories of immigrants in search of work credentials

This report presents the results of a qualitative research study, funded by the Latino Equity Fund of the Boston Foundation, aimed at understanding the challenges that highly skilled immigrants1 face when reentering their careers in Massachusetts

Personal Reflections from a Grassroots Peacebuilding Journey

This article presents the author’s personal reflections from experiences over the past thirty years, working at the intersection of leadership development, complexity, and conflict: a journey from corporate law, the British Army, and armed conflict, through the British Foreign & Commonwealth Office and the US-led coalition’s intervention in Iraq, emergency humanitarian response in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and violence reduction and post-conflict reconciliation in Papua New Guinea, to a Jordan-based international peacebuilding organization that supports grassroots peacebuilding efforts in fifty-two countries, and finally a return home to Scotland. It is a journey of naïveté, hubris, curiosity, and an attempt at sense-making. It describes the application of peacebuilding theories in practice in diverse contexts. Although it does not purport to offer any solutions, it concludes that courageous leadership is needed: to embrace conflict as a source of energy for positive, constructive, generative development; to resist the seductive drama and hero-leadership of focusing only on present crises; and to focus more investment on upstream prevention

Highlights of the Annual Report of the Cohort 3 TPSID Model Demonstration Projects (Year 3, 2022–2023)

This Highlights document was created with data from the Annual Report of the Cohort 3 TPSID Model Demonstration Projects (Year 3, 2022-2023) for those who are interested in the most critical statistics from the report, or are sharing with a broad audience. It features bold graphics and brief summaries of program and student data, including exit and post-exit outcomes

Emotional Social Support Among Asian Americans: Associations with Psychological Symptoms, Well-Being and Buffering Against Effects of Racism

Studies have found that Asian Americans are unwilling to seek professional treatment for psychological symptoms despite reporting significant psychological distress and prefer seeking social support from friends and family (Han & Pong, 2015; Hung, 2005; Masuda & Boone, 2011; Singh, 2015). Asian Americans have been continuously exposed to racist events that are detrimental to well-being, with a notable increase during the COVID-19 pandemic (Armanta et al., 2013; Liu & Suyemoto, 2016; Stop AAPI Hate, 2021). This study sought to examine the degree to which emotional social support is associated with psychological symptoms and well-being, and whether emotional social support would moderate the positive relation between experiencing racism and psychological symptoms, and the negative relation between experiencing racism and well-being. We found that emotional social support was significantly negatively associated with psychological symptoms and significantly positively associated with well-being, but not above and beyond the effects of general social support. We also found that emotional social support did not moderate the relation between experiencing racism and either of the outcome variables, and that the expected relations between experiencing racism and the outcome variables were not found in this sample. Limitations in this study included a possible lack of generalizability due to our participants predominately identifying as cisgendered women, and a lack of specificity in measuring anti-Asian racism in particular in our measures. Future studies would benefit from recruiting a more representative sample, and including measures that assess anti-Asian racism specifically and across several domains of interaction

Visual, Hearing, and Dual Sensory Difficulty in Later Life

Sensory (vision and hearing) loss is a contributor to poor mental health, a variety of physical health outcomes, and a lower quality of life for older adults. As the population ages, the number of older adults with sensory loss and the number of caregivers needed to provide care are expected to increase accordingly, which will have substantial public health implications. Using data from the National Health and Aging Trends Study, and its sister-study, the National Study of Caregiving, this dissertation investigated how sensory difficulty is related to incident dementia and mortality risk among older adults and how care recipients’ sensory difficulty is related to caregiving experiences. This dissertation consists of three separate studies. Study 1 explored the relationship between sensory difficulty, incident dementia, and social and physical activities among older adults. Results from the structural equation modeling-based discrete-time survival mediation model showed that compared to older adults without sensory difficulty, those with visual difficulty or dual sensory difficulty had a higher risk of dementia. Social activity significantly mediated the visual difficulty-dementia link and the dual sensory difficulty-dementia link. Study 2 investigated the relationship between visual difficulty, recurrent falls, and mortality risk among older adults. Results from the discrete-time survival models showed that having visual difficulty at baseline was associated with a higher risk of recurrent falls in the following wave and a higher mortality risk in the subsequent waves. Visual difficulty was related to increased mortality risk via recurrent falls among older adults. Study 3 examined the relationship between older care recipients’ sensory difficulty and caregiver burden experienced by their informal caregivers. Results from linear regression models showed that caregivers of older adults with dual sensory difficulty report more care burden than caregivers of older adults with no sensory difficulty. Moreover, caregivers of older adults with co-occurring dual sensory difficulty and dementia experienced a higher caregiver burden than those of older adults without dual sensory difficulty or dementia. Focusing on a rising public concern among older adults, this dissertation contributes to the research on aging and sensory health. Findings from three studies provided important insights for promoting interventions for older adults with sensory loss and their caregivers