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Founded in 1911, SGA Youth & Family Services, then known as The Joint Committee for Vocational Training, provided vocational and educational guidance to young people applying for work permits. Its distinguished founders included Edith Abbott and Sophonisba Breckenridge, who also founded the forerunner to the School of Social Service Administration at the University of Chicago. Nobel Prize winner, Jane Addams was on the Board of Directors until 1924. Later, SGA shifted its focus to reforming child labor laws, and used scholarships to help keep children in school. For two decades, SGA's scholarship program continued to grow until the Fair Labor Standards Act passed in 1938, establishing child labor laws and eliminating the need for scholarships to keep children in school. As they recognized the need for counseling to address the emotional reasons for school drop out, the Vocational Service Committee and the Scholarship Association for Jewish Children began to hold joint annual meetings, and then joined forces to become SGA. Individual and group therapy and prevention programs remain at the core of our services. Please click here to read a detailed account of the history of SGA.
SGA Youth & Family Services supports the emotional and social development of Chicago area adolescents and young adults by providing therapy, prevention, case management and other supportive services for individuals and families.
SGA provides comprehensive mental health and prevention services to meet the changing needs of Chicago's at-risk youth and their families in the following communities: Austin, Belmont Cragin, Brighton Park, Douglas, Englewood, Grand Boulevard, Greater Grand Crossing, Humboldt Park, Lake View, Logan Square, Lower West Side, New City, North Lawndale, Portage Park, South Chicago, South Lawndale, Uptown, West Town and Woodlawn. SGA also serves clients from other neighborhoods throughout the city. Agency wide in FY 2008, we are offering services at 27 elementary, middle and high schools and four community sites: teen parenting office on west side of the city, Diversion office in Douglas, Northwest Baptist Church in Brighton Park and our administrative office in the South Loop.
View our Program by Communities 2008 list
To make positive choices, adolescents need resources and support to promote optimal growth and build life skills for sound decision-making and problem solving. They need people they can trust and turn to for consistent support, understanding, and the tools to explore and clarify their own values and goals. In the inner city, where violence, racial tension, and isolation threaten teens on a daily basis, the need for trustworthy relationships and psychosocial supports is even more critical, especially for those vulnerable to personal crises, substance abuse, depression, and suicidal behavior. Through professional counseling, psychosocial support, and prevention services, SGA helps troubled youth make a more successful transition into adulthood while at the same time strengthens families and communities.
SGA is accredited by the Council on Accreditation of Services for Families and Children (COA) and has a long standing track record in some of Chicago's highest need communities.
As a long established and community based provider, SGA has in place the following features and benefits which enhance services and ensure smooth operation: highly qualified clinical management that understands the tenets of sound psychotherapeutic and prevention work and clinical staff clinicians who are master's and bachelor's level social workers or counselors licensed by the state as Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW), Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor (LCPC), Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) or Licensed Social Worker (LSW). The agency's clinical training program has been approved by the Illinois Department of Professional Regulation to issue Continuing Education Units for attending in-service and consultation sessions. SGA also has in place strong fiscal management and currently manages multiple contracts and reporting for federal, state and local sources.
Program Coordinators report to the Director of Clinical Programs, a master’s level licensed clinical social worker and graduate of Loyola University with 15 years experience. Our Director of Quality Assurance/Evaluation is a master’s level licensed clinical social worker and graduate of the School of Social Administration at the University of Chicago with more than 20 years experience in community and school-based adolescent treatment. Our Executive Director has a Ph.D. from the Institute for Clinical Social Work, with a specialty in the inter-generational transmission of child abuse. With their combined experience and expertise in adolescent and child development, our management staff is well qualified to create and manage effective intervention and prevention services.
As part of its commitment to the social work profession and in collaboration with local graduate schools of social work, SGA has a strong internship program that provides training experiences for master's and doctorate level interns. Student interns from the Chicago School of Professional Psychology, Argosy University, University of Chicago School of Social Work, Loyola University, and University of Illinois, Jane Addams School of Social Work, both learn and contribute to the work of the agency. They receive close supervision by experienced clinicians who both teach and mentor.
The board, volunteers and staff of SGA Youth & Family Services envision a society
that affords each child and young adult the support, safety, and resources necessary
to realize her or his fullest potential.
- SGA Youth & Family Services is committed to the emotional and social well-being
of its clients, and therefore considers first the needs of the client population
in all organizational decisions.
- SGA Youth & Family Services values the potential of each individual, respects
the contribution each has to offer and celebrates differences as well as
commonalities among diverse people.
- SGA Youth & Family Services values honesty, integrity, trust, respect,
confidentiality, and accountability in its interactions with clients,
staff, board members, funders and other individuals and groups with whom
the agency interacts.
- SGA Youth & Family Services values its history and traditions and preserves
its proud legacy through the continual development of innovative and quality
services responsive to the changing needs of young people and their families
in the Chicago area.
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