I love my job! - Program Director S.T.A.R.R. Family Behavioral Health Employee Review

Love working with a dedicated and supportive team!

You don’t get paid when people don’t show up for session.

Gives you an opportunity to work with those in need of mental and emotional health support. A good opportunity to feel like you've made a difference in someone's life, if you're matched with the right participants. A good fit for someone who likes a lot of independence and minimal supervision and doesn't mind a lot of off-the-clock hours.

Training and supervision is very minimal, especially on appropriate therapeutic modalities. There is a weekly meeting where CBRS staff discusses cases, but other than that, the provider is largely on their own. After a few shadowing sessions with other CBRS providers - which largely amounted to taking a kid to the arcade - I was thrown to the wolves to largely figure things by myself. Was I operating based on some established therapeutic principles? Up to me to figure that out. Other CBRS providers are technically available to ask for advice, but after a few basic shadowing sessions you're largely flying solo unless you really push for it, since the weekly meeting is the only time you're even in the office. Much of this is due to the Idaho CBRS system itself and not necessarily the company. Pay is misleading. You're given an hourly reimbursement rate, but that's it. You aren't paid for any notes/report writing (which is copious and needs to be done after every session) or any other administrative time, such as filling out the enormous re-authorization forms for Medicaid. Driving time and mileage are not reimbursed, nor is there a budget for participant activities. You'll either have to find some free activities to hopefully frame in a therapeutic context (sitting in the park every day only goes so far when you're paired with an ADHD kid with anger issues), or will end up spending some of your hourly pay on your participant just to have a space to sit down in public. When you're paired with homeless kids who haven't eaten in two days, it's hard not to spend some of your session's pay on getting them a sandwich. I spent nearly half of my pay at this company on my participants - sometimes you just need to buy something to sit down inside a building with air conditioning. There is just so much unpaid time. You'll be getting unpaid calls from your clients' ridiculously unqualified parents, and will often find yourself being a babysitter to them as well. Your personal life will disappear. Scheduling is haphazard. You'll be paired with people from two towns over even though you requested Boise clients only, and it's entirely up to you to make your own schedule. You'll have to fit them in during the (likely unorthodox) hours that they're available. You'll likely have a lot of gaps in your schedule where you're killing time - unpaid - throughout the day because you don't want to drive back to Boise between your two Caldwell appointments. There will be tons and tons of unpaid back-and-forth driving and the job basically requires a throwaway car from what the participants will eventually do to it. Other staff will gently try to shoehorn their problem clients onto you as the new person. During my second shadowing session I was introduced as someone who "had a lot of experience working with kids just like [the client]," even though it was my second day on the job. You'll be paired with people who will soil themselves in your car, attempt to grope you or attack you, drop their pants in public, and will try to run into the street. And you'll get this without any real training as to how to handle it or how to appropriately maintain responsibility. At the end of the day, you feel like a disposable contractor (and often a charity provider). On multiple occasions my homeless clients had more money in their pocket than me. Making a living wage at this job will suck up 100% of your time, and while it is often satisfying to feel like you're making a difference in the lives of others, there are better ways to do it.