Developing Reflective Practice in Legal Education
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Added on 2021-04-24
Developing Reflective Practice in Legal Education
Added on 2021-04-24
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LEGAL REPORT AND REFLECTIONRECORD OF CONTACTI am a Social Worker working with the Jonestown Community Health Centre for thelast three years. I have had numerous occasions of interacting with the local people whowere a friendly lot and often volunteered to help the staff at the Community HealthCentre. I knew Mrs. Venus Williams, mother of Dean Williams, the young 19 year oldboy who suffered brain damage in a car accident. Mrs. Williams often devoted time atthe centre and cared about those children and elderly parents who came to the centre forcounselling (Morley, Ablett & Macfarlane, 2014).BACKGROUNDDean is a first-year college student and was suffering from a brain injury inflictedduring a car accident some 6 months ago. On that particular night, Dean and some of hisclassmates were partying at a classmate's house. He left the party at about 1:00 a.m. andwhile driving missed a curve and his car overturned after hitting the verge. AlthoughDean's parents were aware that their son used to drink occasionally, they neversuspected that he had a problem(Swain & Rice (ed), 2009). His father often warnedhim about the dangers of driving after drinking.Mr. Frank Williams, Dean's father is a corporate attorney and Dean always expressed adesire of following his father’s footsteps. Dean's mother, being a house wife, mostlyspent her time caring for her husband and son and devoted all her spare time to thevolunteer work for helping the abused and neglected children of the local community(Swain & Rice (ed), 2009). FINANCESDean's parents are in a position to afford his treatment, but Dean is uncooperative andseldom complies with the treatment regimen. His mother accompanies him to the Centrewhere he comes twice a week for counselling but all the time and money seems to begoing waste as Dean is often uncooperative and remains allusive to the treatment.
HEALTHPhysicalBecause of his damage to the brain, Dean’s impulse control is affected and this hasdecreased his short-term memory and concentration ability making him irritated attimes. He is not able to come to terms with this change in his abilities and this haschanged his behavior (Swain & Rice (ed), 2009). He is now difficult with his parentsand friends and reacts indifferently with them now. Dean's emotional outbursts areunpredictable. He laughs out loud at times and at the next moment he starts crying. Ithas become difficult for him to sustain his attention on his surroundings (Maidment &Bay, 2012). The weakness of his right side muscles has limited his ability ofparticipating in the athletic activities he previously enjoyed. He has become restless andbecomes agitated sometimes, and this frustration is because of the organic aspect of theinjuries which he has sustained (Maidment & Bay, 2012).PsychologicalDean is currently on an emotional roller coaster. Sometimes he speaks that heunderstands his future plans have to be changed but at some moments he is unable toaccept the limitations (Muller, 2014). He still wants things should be the way they were.His mental deficiencies are making it impossible for him to resume a successful collegedegree. In frustration, he even resents the constant supervision which his parents giveand feels resented that he is being treated like a baby. Dean feels frustrated because ofhis disability in remembering, in expressing himself and concentrating on anything(Muller, 2014). Drugs and AlcoholMost of his old colleagues have resumed their college and because of this he has startedhanging out with another younger group and has taken to drinking heavily again. Thishas made Dean's rehabilitation a more arduous task, especially for his parents (Wilson& Powell, 2012). Prior to this accident, Dean was a gregarious young man. In highschool, Dean was popular as a good student and used to play in the football team. Healso loved skiing and skin diving and was expert at riding dirt bikes. Dean’s parentswere stunned when they learned that he along with some of his colleagues used to getdrunk nearly every weekend (Gal & Weiss-Gal (ed), 2013). This information wasshared by another social worker who was running a family counseling session with oneof Dean’s friend along with a rehabilitation team and who had recently attended aseminar on alcohol and other drug problems. Dean's parents found it hard to believe, but
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