Founded in 1970 by a behavioral health hospital and incorporated as a nonprofit in 1983, The Lincoln Center for Family and Youth is an entrepreneurial social enterprise committed to transforming lives and communities.

Headquartered in Audubon, TLC operates across multiple states, providing K-12 alternative education, comprehensive mental and behavioral health services, coaching, counseling, and trauma-informed training.

The Lincoln Center for Family and Youth collaborates with school districts, universities, hospitals, police departments, and nonprofit organizations, offering consultation services to secure federal and state grant funding.

Here are a few of the staff positions currently available at The Lincoln Center for Family and Youth:

Full-time Licensed School-Based Counselor/Social Worker

The School-based Counselor/ Social Worker provides early intervention therapy and counseling services in a Technical School.

They also provide case management and mental health support services at the school and in the homes of at-risk students.

The counselor/social worker will provide consultation services to school personnel, liaison support to community agencies, and training programs for school and community populations.

Services to students include:

• Identify students in need of trauma support and provide prevention, screening, referral and treatment services to students potentially in need of service.
• Provide trauma-informed therapy and counseling interventions (group, individual and/or family) for at-risk students.
• Provide mentoring and other intervention models to children and their families who have experienced trauma or are at risk of experiencing trauma, including those who are low-income, homeless, in foster care, involved in the criminal justice system, unemployed, experiencing a mental illness or substance abuse disorder or not enrolled in or at risk of dropping out of an educational institution.
• Provide case management for students and families requiring multiple resources.
• Provide quality trauma support and behavioral health care services.
• Provide home-based services to the families of students who have experienced or are at risk of experiencing trauma, including those who are low-income, homeless, involved in the child welfare system or involved in the juvenile justice system.

Services to school personnel include:

• Assist teachers with behavior management strategies.
• Provide staff with essential information to better understand factors (cultural, societal, economic, familial, health, etc.) affecting a student’s performance and behavior.
• Train school staff on trauma-informed approaches to education to develop safe, stable and nurturing learning environments that prevent and mitigate the effects of trauma.

Services to districts include:

• Provide consultation regarding school law and school policy including IDEA and Section 504.
• Assist in developing positive behavioral intervention strategies.
• Assist in developing and implementing educational programs, including programs on safety and bullying.
• Develop alternative programs for drop-out, truancy, delinquency, etc.

Services to parent/families

• Work with parents to facilitate their support in their children’s school adjustment.
• Alleviate family stress to enable the child to function more effectively in school & community.
• Assist parents in accessing and utilizing school and community resources.
• Work with those problems in a child’s living situation that affect the child’s adjustment in school (home, school, and community).

School Community Liaison:

• Obtain and coordinate community resources to meet students’ needs.
• Provide health services and intervention strategies by coordinating the services provided by eligible applicants and coordinated care organizations, public health entities, nonprofit youth service providers and community-based organizations.
• Foster and promote communication between the school entity, community and law enforcement.
• Increase access to quality trauma-informed support services and behavioral health care by linking the community with local trauma support and behavioral health systems.
• Help school districts receive adequate support from social and mental health agencies.
• Advocate for new and improved community/school service to meet the needs of students and families.
• Mobilize family, school, and community resources to enable the child to learn as effectively as possible in his or her educational program.
• Help school districts receive adequate support from social and mental health agencies.

Skills and knowledge for this position include:

• Excellent communication and relationship building skills.
• Ability to work effectively on a multi-treatment team.
• Proficient in numerous clinical interventions.
• Knowledge of and ability to access community resources.
• Strong substance abuse intervention skills

Education and experience for this position include:

• Master’s degree required, preferably in counseling or social work.
• At least one of the following licenses is required: Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC), or Licensed Social Worker (LSW), or Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW)

Find out more about the Full-time Licensed School-Based Counselor/Social Worker position.

Full-Time Project Director

The Director will manage project daily operations, ensuring activities are completed and objectives are met within budget.

Essential Functions & Responsibilities:
• Lead the Project Trainer with initiatives related to decreasing incidents of violence in school.
• Implement an evidence-based school safety plan.
• Conduct assessments of schools and individuals to identify safety risks.
• Enhance multidisciplinary teams that identify school violence threats and mitigate those risks.
• Lead the Project Trainer with project work related to addressing student mental health and behavioral challenges and adolescent stressors by way of Socioemotional Learning training.
• Develop and implement multidisciplinary behavioral threat assessment (BTA) and/or intervention teams.
• Provide specialized training or create specialized non-training policies for law enforcement who work in schools and/or with school-age populations such as school resource officers (SROs) and probation officers: Behavioral threat assessment in school settings.
• Serve as the Steering Committee Chair.
• Work toward goals of improving students’ mental health, reducing adverse behaviors, chronic absenteeism, and academic deficits that may result from occurring school violence.
• Manage project daily operations, ensuring activities are completed and objectives are met within budget.
• Coordinate activities with Breakthrough Public Schools and The Lincoln Center for Family and Youth.
• Responsible for ensuring project data is collected for evaluation and project continuous improvement.

Skills:
• Flexible, self-directed, motivated, and meets deadlines.
• Pro-social collaboration, communication, and problem solving.
• Research-based knowledge of youth-focused intervention services.
• Ability to implement and revise partnerships and programs as needed.
• Capacity to work with and unite disparate groups.
• Strong sense of compassion and commitment to helping people.
• Maintaining consistency with program expectations to encourage academic, social, and personal growth.
• Strong relationship- and team-building skills.
• Ability to work in a team-driven environment with social services personnel and educators.
• Ability to communicate clearly.
• Strong organizational skills.
• Multi-tasking capability.
• Detail-oriented.

Education and Experience:
Master’s degree in education, counseling, social work, or related areas and at least 5 years of administrative experience in education. Additionally, the project director will have credentials to train in project evidence-based practices. Preference given to candidates with experience managing federal grants.

 Find out more about the Project Director position.

Full Special Education Teacher

This position for full time special education teacher comes with a generous sign-on bonus.

The Special Education Teacher works with students who have a wide range of socioemotional and mental health needs and/or learning disabilities.

The Special Education Teacher develops and provides specialized instruction to meet the unique needs of students, evaluates and assesses student progress against instructional objectives, and follows PA-mandated due process procedures and functions as IEP manager for assigned students.

The Special Education Teacher must be able to work in a team environment with other educators, special education staff, counselors, and social workers.

The Special Education Teacher should possess a high degree of authenticity, kindness, and empathy while effectively maintaining an environment conducive to academic and socioemotional growth.

Duties & Responsibilities
• Work with students in grades PreK-4 who have a wide variety of socioemotional and mental health needs and/or learning disabilities.
• Assess students’ skills to determine their needs and to develop teaching plans.
• Plan, organize, and assign activities that are specific to each student’s abilities.
• Teach and mentor students as a class, in small groups, and one-on-one.
• Assess student progress and determine the need for additional reinforcement or adjustments to instructional techniques.
• Establish and maintain student control and discipline in the classroom, school premises or during school activities.
• Employ and implement a classroom structure to encourage student responsibility, cooperation and mutual respect consistent with school policies and procedures.
• Provide consultation to classroom teachers regarding classroom adaptations, instructional modifications, adaptive equipment, behavior modification plans and other similar instructional interventions to meet the needs of students.
• Develop and implement Individualized Educational Program (IEP) plans for students to include: present levels of educational performance, special education needs, instructional goals and objectives, and the special education and related services required to meet those goals.
• Implement IEPs, assess students’ performance, and track their progress.
• Update IEPs throughout the school year to reflect students’ progress and goals.
• Discuss student’s progress with parents, teachers, counselors, and administrators.
• Employ various teaching techniques, methods and principles of learning to enable students to meet their IEP goals.
• Provide research-based specialized instruction to address the instructional goals and objectives contained within each student’s IEP.
• Coordinate the delivery of special education services in each student’s IEP.
• Supervise and mentor other teachers who work with special education students.
• Collaborate with teachers, counselors, and social workers to accommodate students’ needs.
• Meet with parents, school administrators, and counselors to discuss updates and changes to the IEPs.
• Schedule team meetings and work cooperatively with child study team members and others to develop instructional goals and strategies.
• Collaborate and consult with educational professionals and community service providers (i.e., social services, public health, medical providers etc.) regarding the needs of students.
• Complete all district and state reporting requirements.
• Perform other comparable duties of a like or similar nature apparent or as assigned.

Skills & Knowledge:
Excellent communication and relationship building skills.
Ability to work effectively on a multi-treatment team.
Knowledge and experience with IEP software.
Strong substance abuse intervention skills.
Knowledge of and ability to access community resources.
Proficient in numerous clinical interventions.

Education & Experience:
Bachelor’s Degree and Pennsylvania Special Education Certification (PreK-12).

Find out more about the Full Time Special Education Teacher position.

See all the available job openings at The Lincoln Center for Family and Youth.