Identity and boundary tensions when educators and mental health professionals collaborate: Between wish and reality

The Teacher Education Program began under the auspices of the Chicago (IL) Instit for Psychoanalysis & evolved into the Human Development & Learning Program when a partnership was formed with DePaul U's School of Education. The certificate program was intended to provide professional training for teachers in ways to work more effectively with difficult children & youth. Drawing from the program's 34-year history, the authors highlight specific tensions they experienced as directors of this collaborative initiative, & how these challenges either were or were not anticipated &/or addressed. The aims are to put a human face on the challenges & struggles encountered in the relationship between education & mental health professionals, & to identify common ground between educational & psychoanalytic theories & practices. 29 References. Adapted from the source document.