Sat, Mar 29, 2025
12:00 pm - 2:00 pm
Instructor: 
Brian Ngo-Smith, LCSW
Type: 
Workshop
Participant Limit: 
15
Tuition: 

$70 General Public
$50 Full Members
$44 CMH Members
$40 Associate Members
$30 Student Members
$30 Scholarship Rate (prior approval required to register at this fee)

Tuition listed above is for early registration ($40 discount off full fee, $15 discount for NCSPP Student Members). For registrations received after the deadline, full tuition will be applied to all registrations.

Tuition does not include the cost of readers.

Early Registration Deadline: 
March 15, 2025
Register Now
Registration Notes: 

NCSPP offers online course registration and payment using PayPal, the Internet’s most trusted payment processor. All major credit cards, as well as checking account debit payments, are accepted.

 

READING GROUP:
Hating Homelessness: How to Survive When Clients and Communities Resist Change

Course Overview: 

In an era of managed care, how can psychoanalytic principles be woven into a community mental health system? By exploring hateful countertransference reactions - both his own and those of members of the community in which he practiced - Brian Ngo-Smith will examine professional tensions that arose in his work with an unhoused client. What do such reactions tell us about the complexities of working psychoanalytically in public practice settings? Through this lens we can begin to understand what a homeless client may represent to her city, as well as to her therapist. This lecture and discussion will consider how psychoanalytic thinking can challenge current "best practices" in community mental health by focusing on long-term stability, while also expanding these ideas into macro practice with larger systems that resist change.

Commitment to Equity: 

NCSPP is aware that historically psychoanalysis has either excluded or pathologized groups outside of the dominant population in terms of age, race, ethnicity, nationality, language, gender, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, disability, and size. As an organization, we are committed to bringing awareness to matters of anti-oppression, inequity, inequality, diversity, and inclusion as they pertain to our educational offerings, our theoretical orientation, our community, and the broader world we all inhabit.

Presenters Response:

- By exploring hateful countertransference reactions.
- Examine professional tensions that arose in his work with an unhoused client.
- To consider how psychoanalytic thinking can challenge current "best practices" in community mental health by focusing on long-term stability, while also expanding these ideas into macro practice with larger systems that resist change.

Instructor(s): 

Brian Ngo-Smith is a psychoanalyst and clinical social worker in Denver, CO. He is on faculty at the Denver Institute for Psychoanalysis at the University of Colorado and the Sue Fairbanks Psychoanalytic Academy at the University of Texas at Austin. He has worked in the mental health field for 20+ years. 

Target Audience & Level: 

Community mental health providers, interns, and trainees who works directly with unhoused individuals or at risk of losing housing as well as clinicians interested in systematic change starting at an individual level.

Cancellation & Refund Policies: 

Enrollees who cancel at least SEVEN DAYS prior to the event date will receive a refund minus a $35 administrative charge. No refunds will be allowed after this time.

Contact Information: 

For program related questions contact Hoa My Nguyen, LCSW, at hoamy.n@gmail.com

For questions related to enrollment, locations, CE credit, special needs, course availability and other administrative issues contact Niki Clay at info@ncspp.org or 415-496-9949.